Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Tensions Soar as U.S. Tries to Head Off Russia-Ukraine Conflict; Thousands Marched in Nation's Capital to Protest Vaccine Mandates; January 6th Committee Speaks to Ex-Attorney General Bill Barr. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired January 23, 2022 - 16:00   ET

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

[16:00:39]

JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jim Acosta in Washington.

Tensions with Russia over what could be an imminent invasion of Ukraine are escalating. The Secretary of State Anthony Blinken telling CNN there would be a severe response by the U.S. and allies if a single additional Russian force enters Ukraine in an aggressive way.

We have also learned of a Kremlin plot exposed by British intelligence that Russian President Vladimir Putin is planning to install a puppet government in Ukraine. And waiting in the wings, an estimated 100,000 Russian troops already stationed at the Ukrainian border.

With fears of an invasion growing, President Biden held a meeting with his security team at Camp David this weekend.

For the very latest let's go to CNN's Clarissa Ward in Kyiv, she's live there for us.

Clarissa, how much power does the U.S. have right now to stop what seems like a steady drumbeat for war? Our top diplomats here in Washington, they're, you know, making all kinds of warnings but it doesn't sound like the message is getting across.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think at least the diplomatic process has not reached a total dead end, Jim. We saw those talks in Geneva between Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov. They at least agreed to keep talking. The U.S. will provide the answers, the written answers to Russia's numerous demands, but certainly it's hard to see where things go from here in terms of how that chasm between Russia's demands and the United States and NATO's concerns can be breached or can somehow be reconciled.

There are still remain huge, huge differences. And all the while seeing Russian aggression continuing. As you mentioned, the British Foreign Office has essentially released a press release, but a minimal information in the press release, about a possible plot to install a pro-Kremlin leader here in Kyiv. They gave the names of four individuals who are outside of the country who are from the former administration of Viktor Yanukovych, who was the Kremlin-backed president here for many years who was forced to flee after the Maidan revolution.

And one candidate they say who is still here, we reached out to him for comment, he basically dismissed the claims. Secretary of State Blinken was also asked about this information or intelligence coming from the British Foreign Office, one U.S. security official has said that it gels with what the U.S. is aware of. Here's what he had to say on the U.S.'s knowledge of this alleged plot, Jim. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTONY BLINKEN, SECRETARY OF STATE: I can't comment on specific pieces of intelligence but, you know, we've been warning about just this kind of tactic for weeks. And we've at least spoken to that publicly. And just last week we sanctioned four agents of Russia, Ukrainians in Ukraine, seeking to destabilize the government. So this is very much a part of the Russian toolkit, it runs the gamut from a large convention incursion or invasion of Ukraine, to kind of destabilizing activities in an attempt to topple the government, and it's important that people on notice about that possibility.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

WARD: Blinken mentioned those four individuals who were sanctioned. One of those individuals is also mentioned in the British Foreign Office press release. Of course the Ukrainians are saying -- they're not giving a huge amount of detail but they're saying it's very important for people to understand and realize what's going on here. The Russians of course, unsurprisingly, are completely denying it, calling it fake disinformation -- Jim.

ACOSTA: All right, and we've heard those kinds of descriptions used before by other leaders around the world.

All right, Clarissa Ward, thank you very much. Appreciate that.

With less two weeks until the Winter Olympics in Beijing, China sent nearly 40 warplanes into Taiwan's Air Defense Identification Zone today, marking the largest incursion in 2022. Taiwan's Defense Ministry said that Chinese warplanes included fighter jets and a nuclear capable bomber. In response, Taiwan's military deployed air defense missile systems to monitor the incursion.

Security has been an all-hands-on-deck operation today in Washington as thousands of protesters gathered to demonstrate against COVID-19 mandates. They marched from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial where some speakers blasted the vaccine mandates and others blasted the vaccines themselves.

CNN's Joe Johns is here with me now.

[16:05:00]

Joe, you've been speaking to the protesters all day. What are they telling you? I worry about even asking that question, but what are they telling you so far? JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know what,

not surprising, Jim, sort of the language of polarization over the pandemic. I walked down here this morning with a whole group of the people who came to the rally at the Lincoln Memorial. And really sort of just got a sense of what they were saying. And it's interesting, especially because this event was billed as an event about medical autonomy, if you will. In other words, the right not to get the shot, the right not to wear the mask.

And as we listen to the speakers, there was that disinformation, the misinformation we sort of heard from -- since the pandemic began. But when you dig a little deeper, what we were hearing from people is that there was real concern about the way they were being received because they rejected the vaccine, also a lot of concern about the federal government, suspicion of the federal government, its handling of the vaccines.

Suspicion of the Biden administration, even of the media and the pharmaceutical industry. So all of this is the kind of stuff we got from people today at this event. And I can also tell you, it's a little hard to sort of characterize the crowd that was here. People came from all walks of life, quite frankly. We did see a lot of former military people we talked to. We saw some teachers. We saw some people who worked in the medical field.

So all of them here today. Some hope that this is the beginning of something big. And there is certainly hope in the medical establishment in Washington that all of this eventually will just go away, Jim. Back to you.

ACOSTA: All right, Joe Johns, thank you very much for that.

Joining us now is Dr. Jonathan Reiner, a CNN medical analyst and professor of medicine and surgery at George Washington University.

Dr. Reiner, what is really horrible is that down on the National Mall, some of these protesters were displaying holocaust imagery, comparing vaccine mandates to the holocaust, which is obviously repugnant. And, you know, one of the other reactions that I had, Dr. Reiner, is that many of these protesters were standing very close to where we used to see those white flags, hundreds of thousands of white flags, marking in memory all of those hundreds of thousands of people we lost in this country to COVID.

What is your reaction to what you're seeing down on the Mall today? It's disturbing.

DR. JONATHAN REINER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Yes. I mean, to say the least. The United States lost 10,000 people last week. We had 10,000 deaths in the United States last week. We've lost 860,000 people, that's three times the number of combat casualty deaths in World War II for the United States. So, you know, to see so many people, first of all denying the magnitude of this pandemic, and then, you know, turning their eyes on something that we know with clarity will almost eliminate your risk of dying is startling. You know, and relating it somehow to what six million jews went

through who were exterminated during the holocaust is to say at the very least repugnant. You know, I just feel that this country has in many ways asked so little of people. You know, we treasure freedom so much that any ask for any citizen in this country appears to be too much. So we're in a pandemic and we miraculously developed a vaccine in record time that is better, more effective than we could have possibly hoped. And a proportion of our country, 25 percent of adults in this country, simply refuse to take it.

ACOSTA: Yes.

REINER: And it's some sort of impingement on their freedom. I never would have guessed this a year ago when we started vaccinating people that we would be in this position.

ACOSTA: Absolutely. And I know you had a strong reaction to a segment you saw on Bill Maher's program in which journalist and author Bari Weiss declared she's, quote, "done on COVID." Let's watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARI WEISS, JOURNALIST: I'm done with COVID. I'm done. It's like, I went so hard on COVID.

BILL MAHER, HOST, "REAL TIME WITH BILL MAHER": Yes, I remember.

WEISS: I sprayed the Pringles cans that I bought at the grocery store. Stripped my clothes off because I thought COVID would be on my clothes.

[16:10:03]

Like I did it all. And then we were told you get the vaccine. You get the vaccine and you get back to normal. And we haven't gotten back to normal. And it's ridiculous at this point. This is going to be remembered by the younger generation as a catastrophic moral crime.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And Dr. Reiner, you told Bari Weiss essentially she needed to grow up.

REINER: Yes. She needed to grow up because she's acting like a child. When you say you don't want to play this game anymore, and you're going to take your ball and go home, you're acting like a child. I like the sacrifices that she enumerated, that she stripped off her clothes when she got home and then she cleaned the grocery cans.

Meanwhile, my colleagues in hospitals all around the country went in to care for people dying from this virus, and continue to do that every day. Man our ERs and our ICUs every day. And for the first year of this pandemic, they did that without any protection of a vaccine. That's the sacrifice they made. And all that we've done is asked the public to wear a mask when you go out and about, and get vaccinated. All right? So I'm glad she's done with it. But I sort of feel like

this country has been in a boat that has filled with water and some of us have been trying to bail out -- bail the water out of this boat for the last two years and now we have people like Bari Weiss basically saying, I'm done, I'm not bailing the water out anymore. And when somebody who is relatively young and relatively healthy says that, what they're saying is, I'll be OK if I get this virus, screw you, doesn't matter to me what happens to you. That's the message I get from her.

ACOSTA: Yes, I'm done with that attitude, honestly. I mean, you know, she needs to understand that trolling people to own the libs is not a sacrifice, Dr. Reiner.

You know, let me ask you about this. Former FDA commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb said today that late March is probably the soonest a COVID vaccine for kids under 5 could be available. How does that time frame sound to you? And what's the message to parents of young children who are ready for this? They want to get their young kids vaccinated and protected.

REINER: Well, I think the end of March would be great. And my message to parents with little kids is hang in there. It's a very difficult time. You're trying to, you know, to walk the line between trying to have some normalcy in your family but protect your kids from getting sick. I understand it. We have to hang in there for just another couple of months. But again, this is easier to do when we're all, you know, singing from the same page here, which is why it's so disturbing to hear people like Miss Weiss say, I'm done. You know, I'm not wearing a mask anymore, I'm not playing by the rules anymore.

ACOSTA: Right. Parents of kids who are under the age of 5 aren't done. They've got to worry about more than wiping off their Pringles cans, they've got to worry about their little kids who might be exposed to people like herself.

REINER: Right.

ACOSTA: Who will not get vaccinated or even if they are vaccinated, you know, just sort of brush off the importance of it at this point. It's just remarkable.

REINER: Right. Every child under 5 in the United States is susceptible to this virus. There are a million children in the United States last week, one million children tested positive for this virus. And while thankfully most kids will do fine should they get infected, we've lost about 860 children to this virus. So this is not a pain-free experience for families in this country if their children get infected.

ACOSTA: Yes.

REINER: And if a kid gets infected, parents can't go to work. You know, perhaps someone more vulnerable, maybe a grandparent in the house. There are a lot of things that happen when a child gets infected. And I completely sympathize with the concerns and the angst of people with little kids in this country. But what I would say so them is help is on the way, hang in there for another couple of months.

ACOSTA: All right, Dr. Reinert, thank you very much, we appreciate it.

REINER: My pleasure, Jim.

ACOSTA: And up next, we just learned the January 6th Committee has been talking to former attorney general Bill Barr. Bill Barr was one of Trump's top defenders until he refused to defend those big lies about election fraud. And legendary journalist Carl Bernstein joins me next. No one would know better than Carl Bernstein what it means when one of the top guys close to the president starts talking. Plus he's got a great new book. We'll talk about all of that coming up.

And make sure you tune in all this week as I host "DEMOCRACY IN PERIL" where we will delve into the dangers to our democracy, that's 9:00 p.m. Eastern all this week on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:19:00]

ACOSTA: The House Select Committee investigating January 6th moving swiftly to address a draft order from December 2020 that would have directed the Pentagon to seize voting machines. The chairman of the January 6th Committee Bennie Thompson today said that they've spoken to Defense officials as well as one-time key Trump ally, former attorney general Bill Barr.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. BENNIE THOMPSON (D-MS): To be honest with you, we've had conversations with the former attorney general already. We've talked to Department of Defense individuals. We are concerned that our military was part of this big lie on promoting that the election was false. So if you're using the military to potentially seize voting machines, even though it's a discussion, the public needs to know.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And Barr stepped down in the same month that this draft order was apparently put together after he broke ranks by rejecting Trump's election conspiracy theories and lies.

[16:20:02]

Let's discuss with CNN political analyst Carl Bernstein. His great new memoir is called "Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom."

Carl, I'm already diving into it, loving it so far. Appreciate you coming on. I want to talk about that in a quick moment, but first, I want to ask you about Bill Barr cooperating with this committee. That is a fascinating development, is it not?

CARL BERNSTEIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, yes. And we've got to know, you know, the extent of the cooperation. But he was in the position to know an awful lot about what Donald Trump was doing to stage a coup. And one of the things we need to say about this investigation is already we know how serious an investigation it is. We know that it's turned up a tremendous amount of information that not only suggests that Donald Trump was intent on staging a coup, it's pretty definitive at this point.

We also know that members of the Vice President Pence's staff are cooperating with the president. The question is about members of his family. But a picture from what we already know is starting to emerge of a criminal, seditious president of the United States, unprecedented in our history in this country. You have to go back to the civil war to find the kind of sedition occurring at a high level in our government such as occurred on January 6th, and right after the election.

And think back to the sedition of the Confederacy. That was led by a member of the Congress, not by a president of the United States. And the fact that the Republican Party has not participated in this investigation, has just decided they will throw in their lot with Donald Trump and his criminality, tells us an awful lot about where this Republican Party is today and how Trump has them under his lock and key.

ACOSTA: And Carl, you know, I do want to talk about your book, because, you know, there are a lot of lessons in there that I think would be instructive today. It's in its first week, already on the top 10 of the "New York Times" bestseller list, congratulations on that. It's an incredible look at your career pre-Watergate.

At one point you detail -- offer details of being on the dictation desk which a lot of younger viewers might not be so familiar with. You were on the dictation desk as news of the Kennedy assassination came in and, you write this, "My hands were shaking," this is as you were taking in dictation from a reporter covering the Kennedy assassination, "And I mistyped 'hospital' without having the time to correct it. The White House deputy press secretary announced officially that the president had died at 1:00 Central Time. Kennedy had been given the last rites by one of the priests. A few seconds later the wire room bells went haywire with the report flash that the president really was dead."

What do you remember about that day? And what is it about those newsrooms of that era that we should be learning from at this point in our history?

BERNSTEIN: Well, let me first say something about this book, "Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom," because it's really about this kid, me, who got the best seat in the country at age 16. I went to work as a copy boy at "The Washington Evening Star," the greatest afternoon paper in America at the time, the opposition paper, and a better paper than "The Washington Post" in those days. And what this memoir is about is this five years from 1960 to '65 when huge events are happening in the nation, not just the inauguration and the election of Kennedy, his assassination, which I'll talk about in a second, the Civil Rights Movement, the passage of the Voting Rights Act, I was able to cover as a 19-year-old kid.

And think of what's happening right now in the Congress of the United States, to strip away -- the Republican Party wants to strip away the Voting Rights Act that was passed in 1965. So it's about this kid that gets the best seat in the country, gets to see these presidents firsthand, and write and report on all the great events in the country, really in my teenage years. And before Watergate, before "The Washington Post." And there's not a word in this after 1965. It's not the old man looking back. It's written in the voice of the kid.

And on the date of the assassination, I came down to the newsroom, I heard the news while I was in a class at the University of Maryland, and the reporter was running out the door and she said to me, "He's dead." And it had not been announced yet that he was dead. I said, how do you know? And she said, well, Jerry O'Leary's brother who works at the CIA, and O'Leary was a great rewrite man at the "Star," got it from his brother.

I ran upstairs to the newsroom. The national editor -- because he knew I could type pretty much faster than anybody, at 90 words a minute, said, Bernstein, put on your headset and he said take David Broder from Dallas, Broder being the top political reporter at the paper.

ACOSTA: Right.

[16:25:06]

BERNSTEIN: And I put on my headset and he started to dictate and he said, two priests walked out of Dallas Memorial Parkland Hospital at 1:10 p.m. today and announced, comma, quote, "The president is dead." I misspelled hospital, as you indicated, because my hands were shaking so bad. But right after that, I was told by the city editor to right away to go up to the Capitol to try and find Speaker McCormick who was the speaker of the House and the next in line after the Vice President Lyndon Johnson who had been sworn in as president or was being sworn in, and to find Speaker McCormick.

Well, I was told he was hiding under his desk. I finally found him surrounded by a Phalanx of Capitol Hill police. From there I was sent to the White House to wait for the body to come back to cover the people in Lafayette Square across the street who were sobbing. Crowds were gathering. I covered the assassination through the weekend. It's just an example of what these wonderful people with this great newspaper let me do, even though when I went to work there, I had one foot in the pool hall, one foot in the juvenile court, and about two inches of a foot in the classroom.

So it's about this kid who gets this amazing seat and what he learns, which is everything that Woodward and I did in Watergate. You can see how in "All the President's Men" we talk about the best obtainable version of the truth. It comes from what I learned at "The Star." And so the lines are clear. It's about what a reporter does, perseverance, knock on doors, learn to make sources, how you deal with those sources. And so it's a book about another time in America, another time in journalism. And yet those basic techniques are the reason we have seen in the

Trump presidency the greatest reporting on a presidency in my lifetime by the greatest number of news organizations, because that methodology, what we know about the Trump presidency we know from the reporting, not from the government.

ACOSTA: And it's so critically important. And Carl, we're so fortunate that you stayed out of that pool hall and you stayed in the newsroom and learned the craft and learned the trade, because we are all the better for it.

Carl Bernstein, thank you so much for your time. We appreciate it.

Check out his great new book "Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom." It's out now.

Carl, we'll have you back soon and we'll wax poetic even more. Thanks so much for your time.

BERNSTEIN: Good to be with you.

ACOSTA: All right. Great talking to you.

Still to come, it's been a deadly weekend across the country for law enforcement. A Texas deputy was killed overnight during a traffic stop less than two days after a deadly shooting of a New York City police officer. Our live report is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

JIM ACOSTA, CNN NEWSROOM HOST: A routine police traffic stop turned deadly in Houston early this morning. A 12-year-old - or excuse me, a 12-year Harris County Deputy was shot and killed after pulling over a car. Deputy Charles Galloway was just 47-years-old. Witnesses say the driver got out of his car and immediately started shooting.

CNN's Nadia Romero is following this story for us. Nadia, just a horrible day for the sheriff's in Houston and part of a disturbing trend across the country where we're seeing law enforcement officers struck down in the line of duty. What else do they know?

NADIA ROMERO, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Jim, and it really makes a lot of think about back in 2016 when those police officers in Dallas were killed by a sniper attack, and here we have yet another incident happening just after midnight.

So it's 47-year-old Charles Galloway, 12-year veteran, a corporal, and a field training officer, and that's really important here because he trained other officers. And so, so many people are impacted by his death. It was supposed to be a routine traffic stop, and witnesses say the suspect got out of his car and immediately started shooting at Corporal Galloway before he even had a chance to get out of his patrol car.

And witnesses and police say that they believe the suspect used an assault-type weapon. Right now authorities say there's no known motive for the shooting. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF TROY FINNER, HOUSTON POLICE DEPT.: He got out of his vehicle and immediately fired upon the deputy multiple times, striking him, and then drove off. This is senseless. It makes no sense whatsoever.

CONSTABLE TED HEAP, HARRIS COUNTY, TEXAS: What we are seeing on what appears to be a regular basis on the streets of Harris County has got to stop. It has got to stop. These are not assaults. These are not attacks. These are brutal, brutal murders.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMERO: And this is especially heartbreaking for Corporal Galloway's surviving daughter and sister. Jim -

ACOSTA: All right. Nadia Romero, a very difficult story, indeed. All right, thank you very much. Meanwhile, in the real world we know Fox has gone from state-run media to former President Trump's personal P.R. firm, but fans of the hit HBO show "Succession" have often wondered what Logan Roy's relationship would be with the former president. It's a great question, and Brian Cox is joining me live with answers like the patriarch at the head of the fictional media behemoth. The man himself has an opinion on just about everything. There he is right there, Brian Cox-Logan Roy in the flesh next in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:39:33]

ACOSTA: OK, everybody. You're in for a treat. Fans of the hit HBO show "Succession" know him as the ruthless billionaire father of one of the most dysfunctional families on TV, and now just like the Logan Roy character he plays, actor Brian Cox is not holding anything back, giving us a brutally-honest assessment of Hollywood during a career spanning more than 50 years. It's all for his new memoir, "Putting the Rabbit in the Hat", and we can tell you there are plenty of famous names mentioned for better or worse we should note along the way as well as behind-the-scenes stories from the show that has made him a household name.

[16:40:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRIAN COX, ACTOR, "SUCCESSION": Boar on the floor! Boar on the floor! Kendall, ring the troops! Boar on the floor! Cal (ph), get down! Gregg, on the floorboard! Come on, Frank! Frank!

NICHOLAS BRAUN, ACTOR: Why am I in this?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How the (censored) would I know, Gregg? You think I have a rightful (ph) explanation for this?

COX: Frank! Feed the piggies (ph), guest of honor! Oink for your sausages, piggies! Oink for your sausages, piggy. Oink, oink.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, Jesus Christ.

COX: Oink for your sausages, Tom.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oink.

COX: Oink. No, no. No half-hearted oink. I want full-hearted oinks.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm not doing it.

COX: Oink, oink, oink, oink! On the count of three the last piggy to eat a sausage is the mole.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That doesn't seem like a very good system.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

ACOSTA: Hilarious and disturbing at the same time. The great actor, Brian Cox, joins me now. We should say "Succession" streams on HBO Max, which is owned by the same parent company as CNN. But Brian, you have said you can't defend your character, Logan Roy, but you can relate to him. When the show first started a lot of people thought this was a show based on Rupert Murdoch and his family, but as the show has evolved there are nods to Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, even the Trump family, what you call the tragedy of entitlement. Let's talk about that. Explain that for us.

COX: Well I think one of the problems is the - this loss of reality that people have when they are entitled. There are a few exceptions, of course, but it seemingly there's a kind of continuing thing of going on. We see the same in my country with Prince Andrew and his - now he's asking for his teddy bears to be counted every night before going to be, and - I mean, it's just ridiculous. I mean, it really is ridiculous.

These people are so spoiled by their wealth and they lose a sense of reality and a sense of where they're coming from, you know. And it's both deeply irritating but also very funny.

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: But is it the Trump family that we're seeing? Is it the Murdoch family that we're seeing? Is it a combination of a bunch of different families that the writers are having some fun with?

COX: Well yes. I think there are influences, of course, but it's the Logan - it's the Roy family really is the principle. So there - they are a created entity. They are a different - you know, they're certainly not as stupid as the Trumps but a little bit more intelligent I think.

(LAUGHTER)

So there's a sort of - you know, but there are crossovers. I can see that, and not too many audiences will make these crossovers (ph). ACOSTA: Absolutely, and you've palyed some magnificent roles over the year. I mean, folks should know the original Hannibal Lecktor in "Manhunter", which is a masterpiece I have to say, "Braveheart", the Jason Borune films, "Churchill", but you also write about the curse of Brian Cox. Can you talk about that?

COX: Well the curse of Brian Cox is this thing of I've been too late to the party in a way. You know, one of the things that throws (ph) problematic, especially in where we are now which is Oscar season, and Oscar season kind of goes on from really - I mean, it's - it should be based on the year's work, but it never is based on the year's work. What it's based on is the work from Thanksgiving to Christmas.

And if a film gets into Thanksgiving and Christmas, you know, you run with a chance, but if your film comes out before then, forget it. You know, and I've been subject to the Brian Cox curse, you know, that - you know, previous (ph) example is "Churchill". I played Churchill and I played it, and it all came out in June, but by the time the other film came along then I was history.

So but I don't - I mean, that's just - you know, that's part of what this business does and you get used to it, especially after 50 years. Well actually nearly 60 years now. You know, I'm sort of immune to it really.

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: Well it's been an amazing career, and so much of it is just so apparent in every page that you write in this book. I don't need to tell you you've gotten quite a bit of press for not just the stories that you tell but the unabashed opinions you give on celebrities. You say of Steven Seagal, and I had to laugh out loud when I read this, "He is as ludicrous in real life as he appears on screen. He radiates a studied serenity, as though he's on a higher plane to the rest of us. And while he's certainly on a different plan, no doubt about it, it's probably now a higher one."

[16:45:00]

And about Johnny Depp you wrote, "I mean Edward Scissorhands. Let's face it, if you come on with hands like that and pale, scarred-face makeup, you don't have to do anything, and he didn't. And subsequently, he's done even less." You also give it to Quentin Tarantino, Ed Norton, Kevin Spacey. You're - no sacred cows in this book.

(CROSSTALK)

COX: Yes, I - no, there are no sacred cows, but I'm a bit too quick sometimes for my own good. You know, I mean, I'll go for the lot sometimes, and I - and frankly, I'm writing - I have written -

(CROSSTALK)

ACOSTA: I can relate to that (ph). COX: -- it's supposed to appear in the American publication but it never got there. There's an addendum which I put everything in perspective. You know, when I say - you know I say - I think I said that Johnny Depp was overrated. I mean, I think Johnny Depp is a very good actor. Don't get me wrong. I don't dislike his acting, but I think he himself would probably admit that he feels he's overrated, but he's quite a shy personality.

And I do think that what happens to a lot of actors is a lot of things get projected onto them, which they - which is sometimes is a bit of a burden. And I suspect that that's a burden for him. I don't know the man. I mean, I'm - I don't dislike any (inaudible) some of his work I think is excellent, but I do feel that that's what he suffers from.

ACOSTA: And turning back to "Succession", the season - this season we saw your character, Logan Roy, essentially picking the GOP nominee for president based on the power he wields as head of a right-wing media empire. If Donald Trump entered that fictional world, how do you think he would have faired with Logan?

COX: How he would have figured with Logan? I don't know Logan would have much respect for Donald Trump. I think he would think he's - there's an element of sham about Donald Trump, and I think Logan would see through that sham. And therefore, he would not take him very seriously.

And certainly if he was around during his last presidency he wouldn't have taken him at all (ph).

(LAUGHTER)

And so, I don't - you know, Logan's - he's not an idiot bloke, and he is quite a smart groupie (ph). And also he comes - he straddles two cultures. He straddles a - the U.K. culture and the American culture, so he has a - he has a sense of the world which is, you know - I mean, he's a miserable (ph). He as miserable as hell, so I don't - I don't excuse him in that way, but I do think he's probably a little - a little bit more intelligent than the ex-POTUS.

ACOSTA: Right. Well that's apparent. And Brian, you made headlines --

(LAUGHTER)

-- you made headlines for saying that your cast mate, Jeremy Strong, quote, "genuinely suffers" while method acting as your son, Kendall Roy, on "Succession". What is it like on this set playing these intense, dysfunctional characters for hours at a time? I'm ean, I can understand why you would say that about your fellow cast members because when you're watching, this is - it is distributing to slip into this world.

COX: Yes. Yes. And I think Kendall is a particularly disturbed character, and he gets more and more disturbed as the show has gone on, and I think it's - you know, it's very heavy playing somebody like Kendall. You've got to have - you know, and I - I mean, Jeremy's - don't get me wrong. Jeremy does the job. He's excellent. We get on very well. Our work together is always very fine, and the scenes like the scene that we had and the dinner scene at the end (inaudible) was - it was a blind eye (ph), and he's great to play with. I mean, you know, really. But I do worry about the fact that this kind of, you know, kind of sinking yourself into the role to such an extent that it's dangerous. You know, you've got to be careful. You know, you've got to be very, very careful with acting.

ACOSTA: Absolutely.

COX: I mean, it's really interesting to me that Daniel Day-Lewis retired at the age of 55. Well I'm 75 and I have no intention of retiring, but it think if I'd lived the life that Daniel had lived in and done it the way he'd done it, I might have retired at 55 as well from sheer exhaustion.

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: No question about it, and you see stories from time-to-time about actors who have plunged too far into those roles and it can take a toll. Before we go, Brian, we have to ask you this question. It is the billion-dollar Logan Roy question at the heart of "Succession". Which child should Logan Roy hand the company over to? It is Kendall? Is it Roman? Is it Shiv? Is it Connor? I mean, I can't imagine it being Connor, but maybe Shiv? What are your thoughts?

[16:50:00]

COX: Well - well I thought it was going to be Shiv. I really did think for a long time it was going to be Shiv, but then Shiv can't keep her mouth shut.

(LAUGHTER)

And that's one of the things that you have to do is keep everything close. You can share too much. I also thought that Roman was in with a chance, but then he's got this potty mouth that gets him into - you know, he's -

ACOSTA: Yes, he does.

COX: -- you know (ph) - you know, maybe I have - you know, Logan has contributed to that, but -

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: Just a touch.

COX: -- you know, so it's very hard to say what child really, you know?

ACOSTA: Well Brian Cox -

COX: And that's what we've left - that's what left of at the end of last season is the fact that he's wanting a successor and he's desperate to find the successor. He'd love it to be one of his own children, but they keep - they - you know, it's like when he says this line, which is I think a great line in the last - very last episode when they're saying they've got money and this and they've got that, and he does say, and I won't swear it, but he does say make your own uh-huh (ph) pile. You know, he really says go. You do it yourself, and that's the problem with them that they're cripple (ph) in a way, and he is partly responsible, but I don't think he's wholly responsible for that. But the situation is responsible for -

ACOSTA: Right.

COX: -- that kind of wealth.

ACOSTA: No question about it. Well Brian Cox, thanks so much for your time. It was such an honor to have you on, and I think somebody on -

(CROSSTALK)

COX: Very nice to be here (ph).

ACOSTA: So somebody on our crew owes me some money because I was betting that we were not going to get through this interview without a little bit of that salty Scottish language that I know that you're sometimes famous for, but -

(LAUGHTER)

COX: Yes, but that's the character. That's not me.

ACOSTA: Oh, that's the character. Yes, sir. You're right. All right, Brian Cox. It was a pleasure. Thank you, sir, so much. Thanks for your time.

COX: Take care. Thank you. Bye-bye.

ACOSTA: All right, and make sure you are buying this book, "Putting the Rabbit in the Hat", and of course, tell your friends and family to head to HBO Max and stream "Succession". You'll look good, trust me. And we'll be right back.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

Come on, Frank! Frank!

NICHOLAS BRAUN, ACTOR: Why am I in this?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How the (censored) would I know, Gregg? You think I -

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:56:35]

ACOSTA: Today in New York City, dozens of NYPD officers line the streets to honor one of their fallen, 22-year-old officer Jason Rivera, as his body was being taken to a funeral home. He was killed when a suspect in a domestic disturbance call opened fire Friday evening, and other officers still in critical condition. New York City Mayor Eric Adams says he's taking new steps to address rising violence in the city, including reinstating a newer version of modified, plain clothes, anti-gun unit officers, and we'll keep tabs on that. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)