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Russian State TV Blames Western Media for Escalating Ukraine Crisis; Trump Dangles Pardons for January 6th Rioters if He Wins in 2024; Spotify to Add Content Advisory to All Podcasts That Discuss COVID; Truckers Hold "Freedom Convoy" to Protest Trudeau's Vaccine Mandates; Dangerous Encounters at Traffic Stop. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired January 30, 2022 - 16:00   ET

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

[16:00:00]

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Law enforcement officers in New York City. We saw two police officers there shot and killed. The gun that the suspect used was stolen -- Fred.

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: All right, Isabel Rosales, thanks so much for brings that to us. Appreciate that.

And thank you for joining me. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. The CNN NEWSROOM continues with Jim Acosta right now.

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

As the threat of war hangs over Ukraine and Russia, Ukraine releases a new tourism slogan. "Keep Calm and Visit Ukraine." The country is extending a vacation invitation, insisting the U.S. is overhyping the prospect of a Russian invasion. All while the buildup of Russian troops at its doorstep reaches levels not seen since the Cold War. And U.S. military officials warned that an invasion could have horrific consequences.

Adding to concerns that Russia is now prepared to strike on short notice, the U.S. has new indications that Russia has positioned supplies of blood near Ukraine's border which of course would be necessary to treat casualties in the event of a conflict. Meanwhile, in Russia, more defiance and an unusual alliance as Russian state TV is embracing the pro-Putin bloviations coming from Tucker Carlson on FOX. That's making it easier for Kremlin controlled media to accuse, quote, "legitimate Western journalists" of instigating a war between Russia and Ukraine.

Let's go to CNN's Nic Robertson in Moscow. Nic, tell us, what are some of these messages that Russian citizens are receiving right now from state television there?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yes, state TV, it's hugely important across the Kremlin because that's how it gets its message out. That's how it's selling what it's doing around Ukraine. Certainly the way that they do this is to play Western media off against other parts of Western media and right now they have a darling in the Western media, and many others who aren't. And that darling is Tucker Carlson from FOX, and the others tend to get a hard time.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON (voice-over): On Russian state TV Western media are getting ridiculed. Like it or not, they think independent journalists are propagandists for the U.S. government creating a provocation for war.

VLADIMIR SOLOVYOV, TV HOST, CH1: You have no idea what's happening in Oman. You have no idea about our history. You have no idea what Russia is about. You have no idea what Ukraine is about, about our usual history. Why have a problem.

ROBERTSON: Vladimir Solovyov hosts his own show. Proudly pushes the Kremlin's views and FOX anchor Tucker Carlson's.

SOLOVYOV: He's a nice guy. He's funny, has his own point of view. He hates Biden, he likes Trump. So what?

ROBERTSON: No irony that in Russia, unlike America, criticizing the president, is off limits. And never more so than now. In the past year, independent media here have been almost completely crushed.

EKATERINA KOTRIKADZE, HOST, TV RAIN: It's a feeling of tense. And it's all the time. You can never be -- you can never be sure that tomorrow you will, you will be all right. You can never be sure that tomorrow your TV station will still be alive.

SOLOVYOV: Ekaterina Kotrikadze is an anchor at TV Rain, one of Russia's last independent stations. It is designated a foreign agent. (INAUDIBLE) Kremlin law that can snuff it out. She is all too familiar with state TV's manipulations. How they use Western media and play Carlson against his broadcast colleagues.

KOTRIKADZE: They just like that there is a person who says, are we going to fight Russia because of this corrupted Eastern European country that we even cannot find on the map? So as soon as he says something that is not in this, you know, direction that they need, he's not going to be a friend anymore.

ROBERTSON: In Russia's propaganda war, truth doesn't matter. What counts is stopping a war they are convinced America is fomenting.

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX HOST: So at this point NATO exists primarily to torment Vladimir Putin.

ROBERTSON: At home facing accusations of being a pro-Putin stooge Carlson has defended some of its pro-Russian comments and said he is not a Russian agent. So will he lose his war-stopping value in Russia?

SOLOVYOV: Come on. This poor guy from FOX News?

(LAUGHTER)

SOLOVYOV: Well, I like that Russian spy colonel of Russian room services.

(END OF VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON: Yes, it's really not the way any respected journalist really wants to be portrayed but once you get in the Kremlin's spin cycle here, there's really no way of telling which way it's going to spit you out, Jim.

[16:05:06]

ACOSTA: No question about it. I mean, and that's why he is very much sounding like Comrade Tucker these days in Moscow.

All right. Nic Robertson, thank you very much for that eye-opening report. We appreciate it.

And joined now by legendary chess grandmaster and very outspoken Putin critic Garry Kasparov. Garry is also the chairman of the Human Rights Foundation and Renew Democracy Initiative.

Garry, you recently made the point that Vladimir Putin is not playing chess here. He's playing choker -- excuse, poker, and you think he is bluffing. What do you make of what we just saw there in Nic Robertson report about how they are, you know, manipulating their audiences into thinking that because Tucker Carlson is spouting these talking points that there is a decent level of support in the United States for what Vladimir Putin is up to right now? What do you think is his overall end game?

GARRY KASPAROV, LEGENDARY CHESS GRANDMASTER: Tucker Carlson or Vladimir Putin?

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: It's a good question. Both.

KASPAROV: Tucker Carlson has become a mouthpiece of Russian propaganda. Yes. He's all over the place. And that's the gift from heaven for Putin's propaganda machine. Now they can quote as a legitimate, host of a big talk show who can address nearly half of American households, and his views are, you know, to say pro-Russia is not correct because it's for pro-Putin. Russia has no interest of fighting this war against Ukraine. Has no interest of subduing neighboring nations and continuing this suicidal aggressive Vladimir Putin's policies.

So in the past we knew people like Tucker Carlson, they were either working directly for self-interest for a communist regime and KGB or they were useful idiots. Now it's probably it's their option, Tucker Carlson, a Trumpist, and for some reasons Donald Trump never criticized Vladimir Putin and it's quite natural for Tucker Carlson to continue this campaign exonerating Putin from whatever he has been doing.

Vladimir Putin is a fascist dictator who has been very consistent in his campaign to destroy the Russian position at home. All people who marched with me peaceful on the streets in Russia either in jail, killed or in exile like myself. And also, Putin launched campaigns, military campaigns, against any country nearby that wanted to escape from his, what he called sphere of influence.

And he was very consistent. Since 2007 when he made his speech in Munich at Security Conference in Europe, so he never retreated from his idea that Russia was in the position to control not only former Soviet Republics, but also Eastern Europe nations, and as we know Putin never limited his ambitions by his part of the world. He was instrumental in propping up Bashar al-Assad in Syria and Maduro, and Russia has never ceased supporting North Korean dictator.

ACOSTA: And Garry, do you think that is why the U.S. is taking Vladimir Putin so seriously to some extent? Because if they were just to come out and do what you're doing right now and call Putin's bluff, wouldn't Putin be tempted to puff out his chest and say, no, I am serious and then do something? I mean, can you talk about how very delicate that proposition is for the U.S. administration?

KASPAROV: Yes. It is delicate. But let's not forget, that's what forced U.S. administration to delve into Putin's problem and only now they show some seriousness, because simply increasing the degree in threats, it doesn't change Putin's calculations. If he doesn't believe, and let's not forget. Putin has -- he never asks why. It's always, why not? So what can stop Putin from attacking Ukraine or doing similar things is a prohibitive cost. And only actions will change Putin's calculations.

So right now he's contemplating whether to take American threats seriously because while, you know, this administration stepped up by cementing opposition to Putin and trying to bring European allies which is not easy considering Putin's corruption in Germany and in other European countries, but it's still, and mind you, it's not enough because we still like a good document that will clearly state that any aggressive action against Ukraine will trigger new sanctions.

That's a big talk, but Putin is a cowboy. Whether the price both economic and also (INAUDIBLE) coming back to Russia from Ukraine will be too high for him.

ACOSTA: And we were just talking about FOX's Tucker Carlson and the pro-Russian sentiment or pro-Putin sentiment that I guess you described it as he's been spinning on air. Let's do another taste of that. Let's get another taste of that and talk about it on the other side.

[16:10:03]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So at this point NATO exists primarily to torment Vladimir Putin who whatever his many faults has no intention of invading Western Europe. He's our most dangerous enemy they scream. We can't let them hurt Ukraine. So it turns out Russia-gate was actually more effective even than we've realized. The Steele dossier has been debunked, but in Washington, the theme remains in force. Russia, Russia, Russia, Russia is bad. The fact is Ukraine is strategically irrelevant to the United States. No rational person could defend a war with Russia over Ukraine.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And Garry, as you know, U.S. policies especially for Republicans who revered Ronald Reagan was always about preventing the expansion of Russia or the Soviet Union I guess during the Cold War, and you know, you were mentioning earlier that there have been moments throughout, you know, recent Russian history where you've seen Americans, American media figures and so on say things that, you know, and those things would be manipulated by Kremlin state television, but have you ever seen somebody as high profile and as popular as Tucker Carlson, somebody who has the reach of Tucker Carlson, to spout this kind of propaganda? These kind of pro-Putin talking points to this effect? It seems to me that we've never have really seen anything like this before, from the American side?

KASPAROV: You're right. Never seen it, I just -- I never could have imagined that I would -- the day would come and I would be discussing with you this topic. Actually, when you look at the FOX News front page, their online version, so you always have Tucker Carlson but you also have many voices from the past like, you know, Nikki Haley or Senator Cotton. When I said from the past, those who are using this Reagan's line and criticizing the same administration that Tucker Carlson is blaming for opposing Putin for not being strong on Putin.

So it's a classical case of cognitive dissonance or schizophrenia but it's very extremely, extremely dangerous and, of course, you know, Tucker Carlson has been fully promoted on Russian television, but what he says, you know, that Ukraine is irrelevant. It's wrong. It's not just because Ukraine is, it's a 45-million nation and it's not a buffer state. This is not the geopolitical bargaining chip.

So Ukraine suffered from Russia's violation of international treaty that has been signed numerous times and guaranteed Ukraine the territory sovereignty. The collapse of Ukraine, and that's Putin's goal, collapse of Ukraine's sovereignty. It will be a challenge of either destruction of the world order that we now, we know seems the end --

ACOSTA: Since end of World War II.

KASPAROV: Yes. Absolutely.

ACOSTA: Yes. Yes, yes.

KASPAROV: So that's why it's not Ukraine. If Ukraine falls into Putin's hands, what about Taiwan? Will Tucker Carlson be so aggressive defending Chinese communist? Because he's now critical but if they attack Taiwan, so that will be another question. Is America, you know, in the position to defend it?

ACOSTA: Yes. Well, we don't want to see him move on to that part of the world.

KASPAROV: Absolutely.

ACOSTA: All right, Garry Kasparov, thank you very much. We appreciate it. Nice talking to you. Thanks for your insights.

KASPAROV: Thank you.

ACOSTA: All right. And coming up, he already incited an insurrection and now Donald Trump says there should be more protests if prosecutors go after him? He's even dangling pardons for the January 6th rioters.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:17:38]

ACOSTA: More proof that democracy is burning in this country and Donald Trump is holding the blowtorch. During a rally in Texas last night the former president dangled pardons for those charged with the deadly January 6th insurrection.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT: If I run and if I win we will treat those people from January 6th fairly. We will treat them fairly.

(CHEERS)

TRUMP: And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons, because they are being treated so unfairly.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Make no mistake, the coup attempt is continuing. Trump also took aim at prosecutors in New York for looking into his business practices and at the district attorney in Fulton County, Georgia, for investigating his attempts to overturn the state's election results. He called on his supporters to stage mass protests if any action is taken against him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: If these radical, vicious, racist prosecutors do anything wrong or illegal, I hope we are going to have in this country the biggest protest we have ever had in Washington, D.C., in New York, in Atlanta and elsewhere, because our country and our elections are corrupt. They're corrupt.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Sounds like he's saying the riot part out loud. My next guest has studied how civil wars erupt around the world and the early signs that are often missed. Barbara Walter is the author "How Civil Wars Start and How to Stop Them." She's also been a member of a CIA advisory panel that assesses where future conflicts might arise.

Barbara, thanks so much for being with us. We appreciate it. You're an expert as I was just saying on how civil wars start. What is your response to Trump's toxic rhetoric at this rally last night? To the hear somebody engage in that kind of rhetoric, you know, and at the same time hinting at the possible comeback run that he's been talking about so much lately?

BARBARA WALTER, AUTHOR, "HOW CIVIL WARS START": Yes. You know, Trump is a wannabe autocrat and wannabe autocrats use propaganda to catapult themselves into the power, and they -- one of the ways they do that is by undercutting the current system convincing people that the current system is corrupt. We see this all over the world and we see this as a precursor to civil war.

As you mentioned earlier, I was on this task force run by the U.S. government between 2017 and the end of 2021, and our job was to come up with a predictive model that helped our government predict where around the world political instability and political violence might break out.

[16:20:10]

We weren't allowed to look at the United States. We didn't talk about the United States. Early on it didn't -- we didn't even consider it could possibly be on our list. But we, the model included over 30 variables. All these things that we thought might be important. Like poverty, income inequality. How ethnically diverse a country is. And it turns out to our great surprise that only two factors were highly predictive.

The first is what we call anocracy. It's a government that's neither fully democratic nor fully autocratic. It's something between. And the second factor is something we call ethnic factionalism. It's when a population in a country with a partial democracy begins organizing itself not around political ideology but around race, ethnicity and religions. Those are the types of countries that tend to experience civil war.

And when countries had those two factors, we put them on a watch list for our government to monitor. And the reason I wrote my book was because I started to see these two factors emerging here in my own country, and I felt that the American public needed to know this.

ACOSTA: And Barbara, I mean, you know, one of the things that people were saying after Trump left office, well, Trump may not be around but Trumpism is still here. But I think we're looking at a situation where we're going to have Trump and Trumpism.

WALTER: Yes.

ACOSTA: What does that mean for this country?

WALTER: That means that these two factors are not going away. That we could easily get another president in power. It could be Trump, but the Republican Party is clearly backing Trumpism. If it's not Trump it's going to be somebody who's going to take careful notes of Trump's playbook. There have -- the Republican Party today has no interest in strengthening democracy. It understands that it is -- it essentially represent as minority of American citizens. If you only appeal to white Christians, you cannot win elections in a

democracy where one person one vote actually counts. And so the playbook is to unravel democracy, is to create guarantees that will help a white minority get into power and maintain power, and, again we know from the task force that if you don't strengthen your democracy and you continue to play racial politics that puts you at high risk of political violence.

ACOSTA: And one of the things that I think we're going to have to brace for is Trump to resume and amp up his attacks on the press, like we saw when he was president. Here's just the latest example of the delusion on the part of Trump's enablers and this government to keep his coup attempt going, to keep that kind of intimidation going.

After President Biden called a FOX reporter an SOB on a hot mic earlier this week -- this past week, GOP Congressman Jim Banks tweeted, "Have we ever seen a president attack and malign the free press like Joe Biden has?" Which is just sort of like, I mean, did his memory hold the whole thing? This is what Trump did. Just a small sample of it when he was in office.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: The fake news is in fact, and I hate to say this, in fact, the enemy of the people.

Thank you for telling me that. See, there's a typical fake news deal. No. Look -- look.

JONATHAN KARL, ABC NEWS: I told you when she was appointed.

TRUMP: You're a third-rate reporter. And what you just said is a disgrace. When you report fake news, which CNN does a lot, you are the enemy of the people.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: All of that is going to come back and what does that do? I mean, I think one of the guardrails that we have in this democracy is having a free press to make sure a dictator-wannabe like Trump doesn't, you know, take us off the cliff. You have to have a free press, you know, holding these leaders accountable, holding their feet to the fire, and my guess is, Barbara, he is going to go right back to using a flame thrower on the free press in this country.

WALTER: Yes. Trump and much of the leadership of the Republican Party today doesn't want a strong democracy. They cannot win with this system. Their challenge, though, is that they have lots of American voters who really do love their country. They love democracy. If you were to ask them point blank, do you want an authoritarian system, or do you want to eliminate democracy, they would say, no.

So if you're the part of a leadership that wants to weaken democracy, or to get rid of it entirely, you can't tell your supporters that's what you're going to do. You have to craft a lie.

[16:25:02]

You have to craft a narrative that says over and over again that the system is rigged. That elections are being stolen from you.

ACOSTA: Right.

WALTER: That the system needs to be taken down. Otherwise, people won't support it. So this is -- propaganda is a very powerful device that strong men across the world use and we're seeing it here now.

ACOSTA: Yes. Well, Trump is not a strong man. He's a weak man but he likes to puff out his chest in this way as a way to bully everybody in his path.

Barbara Walter, thank you so much. We appreciate it. Thanks for your expertise.

WALTER: Yes. My pleasure. Thank you.

ACOSTA: All right.

And coming up, breaking news, Spotify taking action after Joni Mitchell and Neil Young pulled their music over COVID misinformation on the streaming service. Now they're addressing the controversy. We'll tell you how, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:30:18]

ACOSTA: Breaking news into CNN. Spotify is changing its approach after some big-named musicians pulled their music from the streaming service because of COVID misinformation being spread on the platform by podcaster Joe Rogan.

CNN's Natasha Chen joins me now. Natasha, this is very interesting. What are they saying?

NATASHA CHEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, the changes may seem subtle to the average listener on Spotify. But what happened in the last couple of hours is the CEO of Spotify, Daniel Ek, posted a letter online describing what Spotify's rules actually are. He also said that the platform is going to now have a COVID-19 advisory in front of any content that discusses COVID-19 directing people to a resource hub with data-driven facts and resources from trusted people in the medical community.

But let's go into exactly what he said here. There's something very interesting in his letter. It says, "It is important to me that we don't take on the position of being content censor while also making sure there are rules in place." And if we take a close look at the Spotify rules that have been posted for the first time, he says this is an effort to be a bit more transparent. Admittedly, that here are some examples they list of what's not allowed.

For example, saying that COVID-19 is a hoax. Encouraging consumption of bleach to cure illnesses. Suggesting that vaccines are designed to kill. Encouraging people to get COVID-19 to build immunity like hosting coronavirus parties. Now these are not exhaustive, they say, but examples of what's not allowed on their platform.

Of course, this all stems from an open letter earlier this month from more than 250 doctors, nurses, scientists who wrote to Spotify really concerned about Joe Rogan's podcast that specifically spread misinformation about the vaccine, discouraged people from getting the vaccine. They said that Rogan's podcast is just one example of misinformation they're seeing, and now we have heard, of course, artists like Neil Young who have removed music from the platform.

Following Neil Young was Brene Brown who has two exclusive podcasts on Spotify saying she'll pause releasing any new episodes. Joni Mitchell has now decided to follow suit and pull her music as well as Nils Lofgren, the guitarist for Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band. He has said that he encourages all musicians to also stand together, including, Jim, now we're concerns from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle who have a podcast deal with Spotify. They're going to continue to work with Spotify, but did say they have major concerns about the misinformation spread there.

ACOSTA: All right, very interesting. Natasha Chen, thank you very much.

And joining me now CNN medical analyst Dr. Jonathan Reiner. He's a professor of medicine and surgery at George Washington University.

Dr. Reiner, you and I talk so much, we talk about this almost every weekend, about the dangers of COVID misinformation, disinformation. It's prolonged this pandemic. It's killed people left and right. Do you think Spotify is going far enough in this new approach that they're taking?

DR. JONATHAN REINER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: No. So I'm glad that they're saying that you can't post content on Spotify that says that vaccines are intentionally trying to harm people. But why is it OK for people to post content on Spotify that erroneously says that vaccines are not effective and are harmful? Right? There's no opinion here. The thing about science is that it's true whether you believe it or not. And the data shows that our vaccines are extraordinarily effective and very safe.

So Spotify has to limit content that is basically just propagating falsehoods. And that's a falsehood. And the stuff coming out of Joe Rogan's podcast propagates falsehoods.

ACOSTA: And there are so many young, you know, listeners, impressionable who are just eating this stuff up without any kind of, you know.

REINER: Right.

ACOSTA: Scientific, you know, evidence to help them get to the truth on many occasions on his program. It's just bad, bad stuff. REINER: It's not just the young. We've heard this come out of people

like Aaron Rodgers now. He's parroted some of the stuff that's come off that podcast. So it's just amplified as it goes through our communities.

ACOSTA: Totally. And, you know, there's a new Omicron variant. Let's talk about that because it's worrying a lot of people, Dr. Reiner.

[16:35:01]

Preliminary data from the U.K. suggests that transmission is likely to be higher among people infected with the new Omicron variant when compared with the original Omicron variant. What are your thoughts on this? Should we be concerned? And what are the long-term impacts here?

REINER: Well, let me just start by saying we are going to see other variants and this is probably a subvariant, sort of a cousin of Omicron, come up over the next several months. The important piece of information is that this subvariant does not appear to have any difference in vaccine evasion compared to Omicron. So it might be that it is more transmissible, which is hard to believe, since Omicron is about the most transmissible virus we've ever seen, but it does not appear to evade vaccines any more than Omicron. So I think we should all just take a deep breath.

ACOSTA: All right. Very good. And cross our fingers. All right. Dr. Jonathan Reiner, thank you so much. As always, we appreciate it.

Up next, a criminal investigation is under way after an anti-vaccine mandate protest in Ottawa including protesters dancing on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:40:53]

ACOSTA: People around the world are taking to the streets to protest COVID restrictions in their countries. This is in Prague. Thousands of people waving flags and chanting slogans. They're angry at the government for imposing rules aimed at the unvaccinated even though new cases in that country are on the rise.

And in Ottawa crowds are gathering outside the Canadian parliament for a second day protesting vaccine and mask mandates. There are these as we are learning several criminal investigations are now under way related to this protest including desecration of Canada's National War Memorial. Canadian officials say they were sickened to see protesters dancing on that country's Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. This all began as the so-called freedom convoy of truckers who drove across the country for several days before arriving in Ottawa yesterday.

CNN's Paula Newton joins me now from Ottawa. Paula, how unusual is it to see a protest of his magnitude taking place there in the Canadian capital and what about these criminal investigations? This is definitely being ratcheted up. PAULA NEWTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. I mean, we've had large

protests in the city before. The issue here is the fact that it is rowdy, I would say, and the fact that we have these large trucks, these rigs and all of these cars. This convoy. It's basically parked itself just outside of Parliament Hill for several blocks. And the city is in gridlock.

You know, I have to say, Jim, look, most of the protesters have been peaceful. I've been out there. They've been courteous. The problem is these events that we're talking about, dancing on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, defacing, you know, who is basically a charity icon here, Terry Fox, defacing his statue, but also an incident of harassment at a soup kitchen, which police also say they are investigating.

These are the kinds of things that have given this protest an ugly side. I will point out they are still out there. I was out there earlier. Now, look, Jim, this was a protest at first. It was a freedom convoy to protest the vaccine mandate. Not just by Canada but by the Biden administration as well on truckers. It soon touched a nerve with a really vocal minority in Canada. They're sick and tired of these public health restrictions.

I want you to listen to some of them.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm here for the future of Canada. You can't lock up healthy people and expect them to remain healthy. OK? So the children have not been in school. I personally believe that is wrong. We need to drop the masks, drop the mandates and start living our lives again.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This convoy is all about freedom. It's not only with the truck drivers. It's actually for every single person. You, me, buddy down the road. It doesn't matter. It's all about your free choice.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

NEWTON: Now given the potential risk, Jim, Justin Trudeau and his family, he has three kids, live about a mile from Parliament Hill. They have now been moved somewhere. We don't know where. It's an undisclosed location, out of an abundance of caution.

I will also say that former President Trump certainly supporting this group. I've been out there. I have seen Trump supporter signs out there. And this leads to a larger question. Jim, they're still in the downtown corridor. Police just released a statement saying look, we need the trucks to leave, we need people to leave. This city has to start functioning again.

And the issue is, how to leave. The people who have organized this say that they will stay out there months if needed. And a footnote on that. They have raised well over $6 million U.S. to their fund on the GoFundMe page. And believe me in Canadian political terms that is significant fundraising. So if they want to try and, you know, wait out police, I guess they will try. We'll see what happens in the coming hours.

ACOSTA: All right. And we know you'll stay on top of it. Alarming situation there in Ottawa.

Paula Newton, thank you very much. We appreciate it.

And tennis great Rafael Nadal has done it again winning a record- breaking 21st grand slam title in the Australian Open. Nadal almost didn't clinch the victory. He was down two sets at one point but rallied and pulled off the comeback win. Nadal's final match went on for nearly 5.5 hours. The 35-year-old Spaniard now has one more major title than Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic, cementing his place in the record books.

[16:45:03]

And coming up, a CNN special investigation on the dangers of traffic stops and racism on the road.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ACOSTA: Philando Castille, Daunte Wright, Walter Scott, these are just some of the names of men known all across the country killed during traffic stops and they're not alone.

CNN's Sara Sidner has been investigating traffic stops and how dangerous they can be. Here's some of her reporting and a warning, this contains some disturbing material.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHANIE BOTTOM, DRIVER: The two of them grabbed my arm and my hair and threw me on the ground.

[16:50:04]

SARA SIDNER, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (on camera): By your hair?

BOTTOM: Both of my arms and my hair.

SIDNER (voice over): At this point, the officers are trying to get Bottom's wrists handcuffed together.

BOTTOM: They were twisting and twisting and twisting. And then, pop.

SIDNER: She would learn later that her rotator cuff was torn and her shoulder dislocated.

BOTTOM: Terrible. Terrible pain.

UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER: Ma'am, you're under arrest.

BOTTOM: Why? UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER: Good gosh.

BOTTOM: What did I do wrong?

SIDNER: What Bottom had done wrong was drive about 10 miles over the speed limit and failed to stop for the blue lights. For that, she was injured.

UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER: I'm going to stand you up, OK?

BOTTOM: (screams).

UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER: You're going to sit there, then.

BOTTOM: It hurts.

SIDNER: Searched.

UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER: Lean up against your car.

SIDNER: And nearly arrested, but she did not go to jail. She went to the hospital instead after paramedics arrived and determined she had a dislocated shoulder.

SCOTT HOLMES, CIVIL LITIGATION CLINIC, NORTH CAROLINA CENTRAL UNIVERSITY: If you were sentenced for failure to heed blue lights, the punishment is a fine, not getting yanked out of the car by your hair and thrown to the ground and having your shoulder dislocated.

SIDNER: Scott Holmes is the supervising attorney of North Carolina Central University's Civil Litigation Clinic, and one of Bottom's attorneys. He later discovered Bottom was charged in the incident.

HOLMES: She was charged with speeding, 10 over, and failure to heed blue lights and resisting an officer.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And joining me now, CNN senior national correspondent Sara Sidner.

Sara, this is such an important topic. I am so glad you're diving into this and some of the material you just showed, I've not seen some of this footage before. What did police say about the case of that woman we just saw dragged out by her hair? Just so horrible.

SIDNER: Yes. It's really hard to watch, and there's a lot of things going on also in the police officers' mind, as you might imagine. Stephanie Bottom for her part is suing the North Carolina Police Department and sheriff's department that was involved for things such as racial profiling and accusing them of excessive force as well.

But the police departments didn't have anything to say because there is pending litigation. And we hear that. That is sort of a natural response. The police officers the same thing, no comment. The sheriff's department, however, said that it stood by its deputies and the actions of its deputies, and thinking on this, you know, when you talk to police officers from their perspective, you know, here is a person that in their minds may be doing something nefarious because she was speeding, and she did not stop when she saw the siren or heard the sirens. And didn't stop when she saw the light even though she is saying, look, I was playing my music really loud. I was doing what I always do on a long road trip.

ACOSTA: Right.

SIDNER: And by the way, she was on her way to a funeral. So her mind is elsewhere, and this was one of those scenarios where you have, you can look at it from both perspective, but should a person have a dislocated shoulder and, you know, be thrown to the ground by their hair for something that would normally be a fine -- Jim.

ACOSTA: Right. I mean, 10 miles over the speed limit? I mean, what kind of threat did she pose? And, you know, as part of this, Sara, you spent some time riding along with the police for this documentary. I've done that before. You do learn a lot. I mean, the police officers work long hours. They are under a lot of pressure, deal with a lot of bad stuff out on the streets. What did you learn that jumped out to you as you were doing this?

SIDNER: You know, there's a couple of different things. One is, that sense of danger in traffic stops. And that sense of danger, although we look at the statistics as well. And those are pretty surprising. The statistics of the number of officers that are, you know, badly injured or who are killed when it comes to traffic stops. But we've looked at it also from the lens of the emotional impact that it has when you stop someone.

You don't know what's in the car. You don't know what they're going to do. You don't know what they just did before they got in that car. And that's always a worry. But one of the biggest worries as you might imagine I'm sure you know, Jim, is the proliferation of guns in this country. The officers going up to these cars are always worried that the person may have a gun and might use it and you will see some of that in this particular documentary.

Some of the training that they see and some of these incidents that they see where officers are shot and killed are jarring and it makes them feel a lot more nervous, and though they train for this, when they go up to the car that is why they are so very, very careful and concerned, Jim.

ACOSTA: And that may have something to do with why they're so on edge and why some of these situations may escalate, I suppose, when they shouldn't have escalated.

All right, Sara Sidner, excellent, excellent documentary. We're going to look for that later on tonight. Thank you so much. We appreciate it.

Be sure to tune in tonight, the CNN Special Report "Traffic Stop Dangerous Encounters" airs tonight at 9:00. And we'll be right back.

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

The inciter-in-chief is back. At a Texas rally last night former President Donald Trump did more than just tease a 2024 presidential run. He sounded like he is assembling his mob, urging his supporters to hold protests if he's held accountable and thrown in the slammer for trying to pull off a coup to stay in power.

You don't have to read between the lines, just look at how he was reading the lines. This was not his ordinary incoherent buffet of words.