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Roe V. Wade in Jeopardy as Texas Effectively Bans Abortion; Food, Water, Gas in Short Supply in Parts of Louisiana as Temps soar; Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) Threatens Companies, Don't Comply with Records Request. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired September 01, 2021 - 10:00   ET

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

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JIM SCIUTTO, CNN NEWSROOM: A very good Wednesday morning to you. I'm Jim Sciutto.

Breaking overnight, big news, the future of Roe v. Wade now in jeopardy in this country as Texas takes aim at abortion rights with a restrictive new law. As of midnight, a new law taking effect there essentially banning all abortions after six weeks in that state. There is no exception, we should be clear, for rape or incest, none. The Supreme Court and a federal appeals court decided not to take up emergency requests to stop it, one of the strictest in the nation. This law bans abortions before many women even know they're pregnant. It also allows private citizens anywhere in the country to sue abortion providers or anyone who assists a woman in Texas seeking an abortion after six weeks. It could be someone driving them to the clinic as well.

This as the Supreme Court is set to rule on the constitutionality of another abortion law in Mississippi in the upcoming term. That term begins in October. Lots of big decisions coming up on abortion rights in this country.

CNN Supreme Court Analyst Joan Biskupic. Joan, explain this law and this decision, right, because not only is it set at six weeks before many women know they're pregnant, but there's no exception if the mother is raped or the victim of incest.

JOAN BISKUPIC, CNN SUPREME COURT ANALYST: Jim, the country experienced a real, dramatic high point at midnight last night and a real low in the abortion wars. Roe v. Wade and precedent that followed Roe v. Wade said that government could not interfere with a woman's choice for an abortion before the fetus was viable. That could live outside the woman. That's usually at 22, 24 weeks. This is six weeks, as you said, before most women know that they're even pregnant. So this is a serious challenge to all women's abortion rights, but specifically in Texas.

The other thing that's unusual about this law is that it specifically says that the challengers cannot sue the attorney general in Texas, health officials, anyone who normally would be in charge of enforcing this law. Rather, it essentially deputizes private citizens to tell a neighbor -- what the challengers are calling vigilante justice to say that someone has aided and abetted a woman who might be trying to seek an abortion after six weeks. So, it's got that weird quirk there.

And this all occurred last night as women were actually waiting in health clinics for information. And the Supreme Court was totally silent. This really tells you something about the new Supreme Court, the state of abortion in America. And one thing to get back to what you had said about this upcoming Mississippi case that's on the court's docket, that is a case that would ban abortion after 15 weeks. And that had seemed awfully dramatic --

SCIUTTO: So, now it's six weeks in this one.

BISKUPIC: Yes. And in that case, let me just say, Jim, that that was going to be subject to full briefing in the fall and early next year with a decision. This happened on the spot last night with the Supreme Court being totally silent.

SCIUTTO: Let me ask you about that, because this is both a time issue here, that the six-week limit, but also a no exception principle here, not even for rape or incest. By not taking it up, did the Supreme Court, in effect, endorse no exception for rape or incest?

BISKUPIC: That is the signal people are getting. Now, it's a legalistic matter. The Supreme Court's action is not a legal endorsement. It's not an affirmation of this. It's not saying, oh, we're ready to undercut Roe v. Wade without hearing arguments, but that is how this is actually playing out because it has an incredible chilling effect in these clinics across Texas. And it's also the kind of thing that has gotten the attention of abortion rights opponents and advocates across the country saying, well, maybe we should do something like this.

SCIUTTO: This is our path.

BISKUPIC: Exactly right, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Joan Biskupic, I know you're going to continue to follow this, a momentous day on the court there and for women around the country. Thanks so much.

So, let's discuss now with the CEO and president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Alexis McGill Johnson. Thanks so much for joining us this morning.

ALEXIS MCGILL JOHNSON, PRESIDENT AND CEO, PLANNED PARENTHOOD FEDERATION OF AMERICA: Thank you for having me, Jim.

SCIUTTO: So, first, with this Texas law officially in effect in one of the largest states in the union and quite a diverse state, what will this mean for women seeking abortions in Texas? Where will they go now?

JOHNSON: Look, I mean, first of all, my heart is exactly with the patients and the providers in Texas right now. As you just heard, patients and providers were in clinics up until the very last moments yesterday and last week, really trying to provide not just the logistical support to help get people out of state and secure the resources to do so but also to grapple the emotional burden that they're carrying right now that Texas has literally turned back the clock 50 years.

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So, it's an incredibly dark day, not just for the 7 million women of Texas but also to the 80 percent of Americans who believe there should be safe and legal abortion. And, unfortunately, this law, in effect, has de facto taken that right away in Texas.

SCIUTTO: Beyond taking that right away, in general, and vastly decreasing the time window there, right, to six weeks, no exception if a woman is raped or the victim of incest, abused by a family member. What's your reaction to that?

JOHNSON: Well, I mean, look, I think it's completely unconscionable. And we have to understand, right, that most people don't know they're actually pregnant by six weeks. 85 percent of abortion happens in Texas happen after six weeks. So, there could be people waking up today or this week finding out that they are pregnant and not having a full range of options to make the best decision for themselves or their families.

And so, in effect, this law, not only not allowing for exceptions but also empowering any citizen in any state to bring essentially a bounty on to anyone who is supporting someone trying to get an abortion in Texas is really what is just so draconian, putting a $10,000 bounty which is, I think, just emblematic of vigilante justice. It's horrific.

SCIUTTO: Do you see other states looking at this in Texas, and, of course, the case in Mississippi, which the Supreme Court has agreed to take up, will consider this term, look at that and say, we're going to do the same thing? Do you expect to face similar legislation in other states?

JOHNSON: Yes. I mean, look, I think this has been the intent all along. We've seen 600 restrictions introduced in 2021. 90 of them have been enacted. So, yes, if they see this as a pathway, there are about 26 states that could follow suit in quick order over this year. So, yes, we are seeing essentially a path to creating a de facto pre-roe country for many, many states without even actually hearing the verdict in the Mississippi case, which is yet to be argued.

SCIUTTO: As you well know, the conservative majority in the Supreme Court now is 6-3. What is -- and, of course, they could surprise, right, on the Mississippi ruling. We don't know. It's possible. But given their stated positions, given that conservative makeup, what is the legal path for Planned Parenthood and others seeking to protect abortion rights now? Is there a legal path?

JOHNSON: Look, I mean, for as long as I've been involved in this movement, the courts have actually been our backstop, right, to fight against these horrific bans and restrictions that really cut against our constitutional right that was codified during Roe v. Wade. And so the fight that we have will be state by state, making sure that there's no state in the union that doesn't believe that Roe should be the law of the land, that doesn't believe that we should have access to safe and legal abortion, and we will have to essentially engage in fighting in those states to really expand access where we can and to push back on these horrific restrictions.

SCIUTTO: Alexis McGill Johnson, thanks so much for joining us this morning.

JOHNSON: Thank you for having me.

SCIUTTO: Well, we're seeing devastating images from the aftermath of Hurricane Ida. One official says that half of the homes in Grand Isle, Louisiana, Barrier Island, right on the coast, south of New Orleans, were completely wiped away by the storm, half.

Right now, more than 985,000 households in Louisiana are without power. Of course, many households with more than one person there, that's a lot of people. Some parts of the state are running out of water, gas, medical supplies.

The governor has told residents who evacuated to stay away from storm- damaged cities as temperatures in some areas could hit triple digits again today. Of course, no power, no air-conditioning.

CNN's Ed Lavandera is at a water distribution center in LaPlace, Louisiana. Ed, tell us, how many people are you seeing there?

ED LAVANDERA, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, this site just opened a few minutes ago and the line has already wrapped around on to the main highway that goes (ph) to this town. You can see the piles of bottled water that they have. And this long line of cars goes out on to the main highway and wraps around. And this is where they're distributing all sorts of other food and supplies to whoever shows up here.

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It is in a strip center here that has basically just been ravaged by this storm.

And I was talking with this lady here a second ago. We'll catch up with her. Her name is Edie (ph). Edie (ph), we're live on CNN right now. Thanks for waiting for us. We got out of the line there so we weren't holding people up there.

But you were telling me the last couple days have been pretty rough.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. We won't stay for another one. It tore the -- well, the whole master bedroom ceiling collapsed and all the water came pouring in and the garage is there. we still don't have tarps. We had a fifth-wheel trailer parked in the driveway. It moved it literally ten off the slab. And now, the front jacks are embedded in the ground, probably a foot. So, yes, it's bad.

LAVANDERA: And you're staying at your home through all this?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, we are. We have a generator, thank God. But the worry is that we've been trying to get the insulation out for the master bedroom, where everything fell in. And that's got to be dangerous. We just put on masks and try to shovel up what we can.

LAVANDERA: We're three days into all of this. I imagine you're running low of supplies. Is that why you're here?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, exactly. Exactly, yes.

LAVANDERA: How worried are you about the coming days and just how difficult it's going to be, waiting for the power to come back on?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I work at the V.A. in New Orleans, and we thought we were going to go in today. I'm worried that I'm not going to have gas to get into work, and I know they need us there. But they canceled the clinics for today, so it's okay. I don't know. It's just -- I don't know that I'll be able to get gas to get into New Orleans to work.

LAVANDERA: Right. And I've seen the lines for the gas are brutal here in LaPlace.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's crazy. We have a boat that people -- we've been getting gasoline out of that to give to relatives and stuff to run their generators. So -- but I don't know how much longer the gas is going to remain in the boat that we can siphon off for people.

LAVANDERA: Are you still amazed at just how much damage and destruction this storm did here in this town?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When we got up the morning after it came through, we opened the door and it was nothing but water all the way up to the -- our house has never flooded but we had an inch in the garage and it was all the way up to the front door. And it took days for it to go down. Today is the first day I've been able to get out because where we are, it floods, the street floods. So, it's just crazy.

LAVANDERA: And I imagine being inside your home when the roof starts collapsing around, you must be devastated.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We were terrified. We had a little dog that was in the bed in the master bedroom under the covers when it fell in. We didn't know. We heard all this noise and we turned around and the ceiling fell in. And so my sweetie was trying to get the dog out of the bed with all the ceiling and insulation that was on her to get her out, just crazy.

LAVANDERA: All right. Anyway, you hang in there and best of luck and try to stay calm as possible, I guess.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We will, of course. LAVANDERA: All right. Good talking to you. Thank you for the time.

So, Jim, this is the scene that so many people are dealing with here, is the reality and the difficulty of this situation and how they're just now really starting to settle into it. 90 percent of the town of LaPlace is still without power, and local officials here are really preparing and urging residents to brace themselves that this is going to take several weeks to repair. In fact, this is a city that has two exits off of Interstate 10. One of the exits is shut down. It's still under water. So, that gives you a sense of how much work needs to be done here to get things back to normal, Jim.

SCIUTTO: No questions, so many people in need there. Ed Lavandera, thank you.

Nearly all of New Orleans is still without power after this. Joining me now to talk about the aftermath, New Orleans City Council Member Joseph Giarusso. Good to have you on this morning.

We know you have got a lot of work to do. Let's start on the electricity issue, if we can. How long before it's restored?

JOSEPH GIARRUSSO, NEW ORLEANS CITY COUNCIL: Well, actually, they've already started to restoring. There's a sliver of New Orleans East that got the first power today. So, Entergy beat its estimated timeline by about 24 hours. Of course, the big question then becomes, well, that's great, how are we going to prioritize there for first responders, hospitals, nursing homes or sewage and water board. And the, typically, what happens, Jim, is every place that has the largest grid amount by number of people in the population is generally what gets powered next.

Of course, the distribution lines, the transformers being down will be a variable there. But I'm encouraged by the fact that it's 24 hours in advance. And, of course, everybody wants to know what discuss that mean for my neighborhood.

SCIUTTO: We've been talking folks ability what they need in New Orleans. I'm going to play some of their comments. I'm sure you've heard similar as well. Have a listen. I want to get your reaction.

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YOLANDA TEAGUE, RESIDENT OF ALGIERS NEIGHBORHOOD OF NEW ORLEANS: My roof in my living room is caved in right now. So, when it rains right now, we get water inside the house. So we had to move all my living room furniture out of the living room and we're like migrating. It's a four-bedroom house. So, right now, we're living in like two bedrooms.

REPORTER: What's your biggest worry right now, Yolanda?

TEAGUE: Running out of food and beverages. And I have a son with my heart condition. That's my biggest concern, is him.

LEA MACK, RESIDENT OF ALGIERS NEIGHBORHOOD OF NEW ORLEANS: The biggest failure is this colossal failure of Entergy Corporation. [10:15:03]

They're the only game in time, nine parishes or counties without power. Nine, really?

SCIUTTO: Listening to that there, particularly about power, I mean, is there an issue with the grid that should have been solved in advance of this?

GIARRUSSO: Well, I think the major issue is we lost eight transmissions lines that power the entire city. And the question, of course, as we going forward, is going to be what happened. Now, I'm going to say this very clearly. Our first priority as city government is getting the power restored. That is the thing that we are constantly talking to Entergy about. We're keeping the pressure on so that Entergy goes up.

After all that happens, then we're going to start making all the necessary inquiries into what happened and the who, what, when, where, why and how, so we can make sure for people to avoid this situation in the future and be as resilient as we need to be.

SCIUTTO: I get that. And, by the way, some things did work, right? Preparations in advance, like the levees held. And a lot of that was investment post-Katrina to keep them up and running. I just wonder, was there something related to electricity that was not taken care of and how long do you think it is before this is resolved?

GIARRUSSO: Well, Jim, I think it's two different things, right? You just mentioned the levee system. The federal government spent $14.5 billion to make sure all that was strengthened. The levees held. And I think that's absolutely the best news possible. Now, that we know that the levees held, the questions turn to, how come telecom didn't work, how come some of our drainage wasn't quite right, and how come, obviously, and probably most importantly, the power isn't right?

Now, look, in New Orleans, we have a unique situation unlike many of the surrounding areas (INAUDIBLE) earlier. We have FEMA money from earlier, we have a bond issuance, we're getting ARP money, we're going to get additional federal money. This is an opportunity not only to have a post-mortem and diagnose what went wrong here, but much like we rebuilt after Katrina, how do we build back better and stronger.

SCIUTTO: Joseph Giarrusso, we know you've got a lot of work to do. Thanks so much for coming on this morning.

GIARRUSSO: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: Still to come this hour, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is threatening companies who may comply with the January 6th investigation with lawful request to reply. What's his reasoning behind interfering with a federal probe?

Plus, a physical fight over masks in schools erupts at yet one more school board meeting, this one in Florida. This as several counties move forward with mask mandates despite financial penalties imposed by the governor. We're going to be live from Miami.

And the Taliban is now showing off weapons and military vehicles stolen from retreating Afghan forces as concerns in that country grow over the fates of millions of women, children, Afghans who worked for the U.S. as well. I'm going to speak to a former Navy intelligence officer who fled Afghanistan as a child, her story and where she thinks her former country goes now.

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SCIUTTO: House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is threatening telecoms and social media companies that cooperate with the January 6th select committee investigating the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. McCarthy warned them that if they comply, a future Republican majority will, quote, not forget.

In a statement he wrote, if these companies comply with the Democrat's order to turn over private information, they are in violation of federal law and subject to losing their ability to operate in the United States. That is a city lawmaker threatening private companies not to be able to do business anymore.

CNN's Manu Raju is live on Capitol Hill. So, Manu, I mean, it certainly sounds like a threat with the expectation he has of taking the majority in 2022. Is that running afoul of ethics rules?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It could potentially be a cause of an ethics investigation, according to House ethics rules experts who I spoke to. One rule in particular to that has been pointed to me is House Rule 23. That is a general rule saying that members should not act in ways that could discredit the House. And one Democratic ethics expert, Norm Eisen, who I just spoke to moments ago, said what can be more discreditable than the leader of House minority openly shaking down companies and threatening them not to comply with an investigation that could impact some Republican members of his own conference.

Remember what the select committee is asking for, 35 letters that the committee -- the members, seven Democrats, two Republicans, they sent letter to 35 companies asking them to preserve records involving communications with certain individuals.

They didn't say who those certain individuals are. But from our own reporting, we have learned that some of those certain individuals are Republican members of the House conference. Now, those people are people who participated in that so-called Stop the Steal rally that happened just hours before the deadly insurrection at the Capitol on January 6th.

This investigation appears to be looking at any potential attempt to coordinate or discuss with the perpetrators who broke into the building, with any efforts to coordinate with members of Congress. We don't know if there's any evidence of that yet, but it's clearly an area they're looking at.

What Kevin McCarthy is saying to these companies is that if they participate with this investigation, potentially, there could be repercussions in a House Republican majority.

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And there's a real chance Republicans could take back the House in 2022. In fact, they are favored to in a number of ways.

So, the question here, Jim, is whether his threat here could impact these companies' decision to cooperate, and then if they don't cooperate, how do the Democrats respond. Jim?

SCIUTTO: Manu Raju, thanks very much.

Coming up ahead, the debate over masks in Florida schools sparked fights again. Deputies had to break up a fight between parents outside a school board meeting. We're going to be live next.

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