Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Horrors of War; Kevin McCarthy Caught on Tape; Russia Targets Southern Ukraine. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired April 22, 2022 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:00]

AMARA WALKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Whether or not Marjorie Taylor Greene should be disqualified from running for Congress again, John.

JOHN KING, CNN HOST: Amara Walker, grateful for the live reporting in that important case.

And thanks for your time today on INSIDE POLITICS. Hope you can have a good weekend.

Ana Cabrera picks up our coverage right now.

ANA CABRERA, CNN HOST: Hello, and thanks for being with us on this Friday. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York.

We begin this hour in Southern Ukraine, where 100,000 civilians remain trapped in the bombed out ruins of Mariupol, and hopes for a mass evacuation or foundering. The president of the European Council just spoke with Russia's Vladimir Putin and called for safe passage through humanitarian corridors.

And, in that call, Putin reportedly accused the Ukrainian government of not allowing its troops to surrender at Mariupol's steel factory, which has become the last stand of resistance in that city. Hundreds of Ukrainian soldiers and civilians are inside now surrounded by a Russian blockade.

And, here, you see pro-Russian forces parading down a Mariupol street, as the Kremlin reveals for the first time its goal, seize full control of Southern and Eastern Ukraine to provide a land bridge to Crimea. This morning here on CNN, Mariupol's mayor said the civilian losses in his city are horrific.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VADYM BOYCHENKO, MAYOR OF MARIUPOL, UKRAINE (through translator): We have around 20,000 dead, civilian deaths in Mariupol. And these were people who were buried by enemy shelling, by enemy bombardment, buried under the rubble.

And, at the moment, we are witnessing the enemy trying to hide the evidence of their crimes, using the instrument of mass graves.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: CNN's Nic Robertson joins us in Brussels.

Nic, what else do we know about this call between Putin and the president of the European Council?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yes, blunt and direct is how Charles Michel is characterizing the call with Putin.

It lasted 90 minutes' long. The reason the European Council president wanted to have this call, he said, was so that he could punch through any potential vacuum of information around President Putin. Of course, Michel has just been to Kyiv, and he has witnessed what he has called atrocities, war crimes, said that the people responsible should be held to account.

And in that conversation, he was telling President Putin just the responsibility for the deaths that lie with President Putin, that Putin should stop the war, that the E.U. sanctions were going to continue as long as the war and Russia's troops remain -- as long as the war goes on and Russia's troops remain in Ukraine.

So, from the European Council president's perspective, this was a necessary message to deal directly with President Putin after everything he has witnessed.

CABRERA: But help us better understand the rationale of continuing to have these calls, at least if you're Putin, because he certainly doesn't seem open to a change of course at this point.

ROBERTSON: Yes, Putin sort of laying out the second phase of the war, his military chiefs are, that they want this land corridor to Crimea in the south that they're willing to punch through even further through Ukrainian territory to Transnistria and the country of Moldova, and potentially cut Ukraine off from the Black Sea.

That's massive. So, yes, Putin is -- he might have given up on Kyiv for right now, but is certainly on track for a lot of the other things he was understood to aim for. So, the point of doing this is, it seems -- and this is what the Austrian chancellor did when he went to Moscow just a week or so ago, after going to Kyiv as well -- is to go face to face with Putin and give him the ground reality of what the West sees, and how long the sanctions will stay in place, that there will be no gains out of this for Russia.

Putin continues to disbelieve in Western unity, continues to stare down the West, and, frankly, recognizes that NATO isn't going to step over the border in Ukraine, and that no one he thinks that's mightier than the Russian army is going to stop him going after what he wants, let alone forcing Russia off that territory afterwards, which, of course, is the whole rationale of trying to speed up weapons deliveries to Ukraine, of trying to get more money to Ukraine, because the urgency is in the moment right now.

And Putin knows that. He's talking, playing for time, trying to get the gains on the ground, because he knows no one will stop him.

CABRERA: Nic Robertson, thank you for your reporting.

Let's do a quick visual walk-through on Ukraine and the latest developments, in keeping with the Kremlin's now stated goal of establishing a land bridge from Russia's western border here kind of in the Donbass region all the way to Crimea.

Russia appears to be intensifying its attacks. In the southern region of Mykolaiv, we're learning new shelling has killed at least one person and wounded at least 20 others.

[13:05:00]

And I want to zoom in here to the eastern part of the country, heavy fighting reported overnight in both the Luhansk and Donetsk regions. Civilians are being forced to take refuge in underground shelters. But there's just no escaping the trauma.

CNN's Ben Wedeman is in Kramatorsk, you can see, you just a little bit to the north and west. And he spoke to one terrified group huddling beneath a bombed-out theater.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): "I want to go home," she says. "I have suffered too much. I have seen the fire and the smoke. I have seen it all. I'm scared."

Nina's plea, simple: "Help us. Help us."

Her daughter Ludmila struggles to comfort her.

"We're praying to God to stop it," she says, "to hear us."

Ina says: "I have nowhere to go. I have no friends, no relatives."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: Again, that was in Kramatorsk. That's here.

And now we're learning about what happened here in Popasna, where Russian troops apparently opened fire today on at least one bus, evacuating people out of this city. Again, this is in the Luhansk region. Somehow, no one was injured. And all 25 people are now safe.

We also learned some refugees from Mariupol did make it out. And they have now arrived in Western Ukraine, but thousands of others still remain trapped in this port city, including those taking shelter at a steel factory. You see where it is here in Mariupol. Hundreds of soldiers and civilians are inside. And they are now surrounded by Russian troops.

Russia says it will not storm this plant, but instead choke it off with a blockade.

I want to bring in retired U.S. Army Major Mike Lyons.

And, Major, today, Russia publicly confirmed their goal in this offensive is to take control of the southeastern coastline, to create a land bridge between the Donbass region and Crimea. Strategically, it makes sense. But are you surprised Russia is now spelling out their plans?

MAJ. MIKE LYONS (RET.), U.S. ARMY: Yes, thanks for having me, Ana.

The Russian general says the quiet part out loud, basically. And, in some ways, they're just warming up. Now that they can take credit, so to speak, for taking Mariupol, not letting those civilians leave, those soldiers leave. They're going to redeploy soldiers elsewhere.

So, they have to now likely look west, look to Odessa, possibly Moldova, as they look to expand their reach. But they have not proven any competency to fight what is essentially a two-front war. We have got about 80,000 troops in the Donbass in that region to the east. And the Ukraine military's performing superbly there.

The challenge we're going to have, though, is get the kind of equipment that we're sending to the south, to that area, to help them defend that coastline, just based on distance, from the Polish border down there, 300 or 400 miles or so. That, I think, is going to be the challenge.

But the race is on. And, again, the Russians just look like they're just warming up.

CABRERA: I mean, it seems to be one of the reasons it has taken Russia longer to make advances in the south is because they have had to put so much into Mariupol

The Ukrainian fighters there have been so, so strong-willed. And so, if Mariupol is the keystone of his strategy, Ukraine's desperate resistance there has now bogged down the Russian troops, who could have been fighting elsewhere for the past 50-plus days. How important has that been for Ukraine's overall defense?

LYONS: It's been key and critical.

And they actually stocked supplies and ammunition in that steel factory for years. They knew this was going to happen back in 2014 when the airport was captured. They decided to learn from then.

The Ukraine military has been very smart. And they have been -- they have prepositioned certain stockpiles that they knew they were going to use. They have been doing it now in Odessa, as they have dug in, and they're putting a very deliberate defense that's in place there.

And I think we have got to figure out a way to, again, to get them more supplies, get them artillery, keep Russia at arm's length at least. Now, they're going to attack with artillery, attack with cruise missiles, and try to do what they can to soften up the targets. That's the way Russia rolls.

But there's a likelihood that we could do that. But, again, the Ukraine military has been superb on the defense. And they're going to continue to be, likely.

CABRERA: The Russian general who laid out the southeastern strategy mentioned it would give also Russia some access to a separatist chunk of Moldova. You hit on this.

Do you see that as a signal Moldova is next on the list?

LYONS: There's a possibility.

Transnistria is that area. That's a contested area on the Moldova- Ukraine border. There's not a lot of Russian soldiers there. We don't know the exact amount, let's say two battalion tactical groups of let's say 2,000 Russian soldiers. It's landlocked, and not much that they can really do.

But on the other side, the Moldova military is not very strong as well, maybe 5,000 to 6,000 active-duty forces. They have got a small air force. One of the things as we should be looking at is moving heavy equipment there at this point, helping them try to reinforce that border.

[13:10:06]

This war is about borders. That was the -- that's the red line. Those are the red lines that NATO can't cross. It's not necessarily things that happen on the ground. It's not the atrocities. It's won't be chemical attacks, God forbid, even a nuclear attack.

The red lines are these borders that we are all abiding by. So let's start to get in the game. Let's start shoring up that border between Moldova and Ukraine. And let's start moving equipment there as well, in order to help reinforce what I think could potentially be a fight there.

But, right now, Russia doesn't have the troops to make this a two- front war. And I'm just really surprised that they're saying this right now.

CABRERA: And yet, today, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said it's a realistic possibility Russia could win this war. That may be true. But is that what you want to hear from a NATO leader right now?

Why not say something like, we will ensure Putin doesn't win?

LYONS: Well, we have not defined what winning looks like on both sides. And, right now, the Russian leader, Putin, will define winning as possibly taking that southern crescent of Ukraine, hasn't proven that he will take Kyiv, obviously. And he's withdrawn forces from there. What does that look like? Would Ukraine negotiate something that stops the fighting that gives that region up? I don't know. That's for them to decide. Perhaps they keep guerrilla conflicts going for many years to come.

But to say where Ukraine will lose -- I think that Ukraine wins by not losing. And I think, if they continue to fight, again, heroically in the east -- in the Donbass region for example, they're doing things that you never would thought that they would be able to do against a Russian military. They're not allowing them to move along axis of advance.

And that -- a lot of it has to do with the fact that the Russian military, not very professional, showing no courage, no real will to fight, all those things that we have seen in these reports about them not getting along and morale-wise.

So it's not good that he says that. I think that kind of propaganda faces off back to the east. But, again, let's keep pouring that equipment into Ukraine and Moldova now and let's see what happens.

CABRERA: Major Mike Lyons, I really appreciate your expertise. I think it's the first time you and I have spoken directly. It's great to have you as part of the program today. Thanks for joining us.

A big denial debunked. There are more tapes revealing House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy discussing Donald Trump's role on January 6, even saying Trump himself admitted some responsibility for that violent day. McCarthy can try to deny it, but you can hear it all for yourself just ahead.

Plus, a community rocked by a terrifying medical mystery. Health officials are investigating more than 100 brain tumors, some cancerous, and all seemingly connected to one high school in New Jersey. We will talk to a man living through this nightmare who started his own investigation.

You're in the CNN NEWSROOM. Stay right there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:17:10]

CABRERA: He is just 16 years old, but he's already seen more death and destruction than most people will witness in a lifetime.

The innocence of childhood is another casualty of Russia's assault on Ukraine.

CNN's Ed Lavandera takes a look at this war through the eyes of a teenager.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ED LAVANDERA, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hidden behind a row of homes in the town of Borodyanka, Ukrainian police exhume the bodies of nine civilians killed by Russian soldiers. They're documenting evidence of war crimes.

This mother stands over her son's body left in a makeshift grave.

On the other side of the graves, we notice Ivan Onufrienko staring quietly at the grave of another victim.

(on camera): One of your friends is buried here?

(voice-over): Ivan says his friend was killed by Russian shrapnel as she tried to escape the city. The cross bearing Katya's name was made by his grandfather, who dug this shallow grave because they couldn't store the bodies at the hospital.

IVAN ONUFRIENKO, UKRAINE RESIDENT (through interpreter): I can't take this well when I see this. I cry but I'm not showing this. I feel weak, weak because I cannot do anything.

LAVANDERA: Ivan is 16 years old.

In two months of war, he's witnessed the innocence of childhood die before his eyes. Watching Ivan makes you wonder how a teenage mind copes with the horror in front of him. His family says, to understand, we must see what they experienced.

Ivan's family never left this backyard shed for more than 30 days while Russian troops occupied the city. Ivan's grandfather and father showed us how they survived on nothing but homemade bread.

(on camera): So, basically, they would take the grain, the raw grain, and grind it down into flour or a version of flour, and then they would make their own bread in this oven. And that's what they lived on for more than a month.

(voice-over): Five adults and four children hid in this underground bunker. This is where Ivan heard weeks of artillery blast and cries for help, the sounds of war that will haunt survivors forever.

ONUFRIENKO (through translator): I slept here. My sister and my mom slept here. And another family slept here too. We tried to curl up and sleep here together. Sometimes, when things got really scary, our dads would come down and stay with us.

LAVANDERA: Ivan's grandfather, Serhey, says he says Russian soldiers told him the family would be killed if they tried to escape. Police say more than 50 people were killed here, many of them shot as they tried to run away. The death toll is expected to climb.

(on camera): How frightening was this experience for you?

[13:20:00]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I can't express it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): It's war.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): It is. It is scary. UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We never felt anything like

that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): They were hitting everything, smashing it.

LAVANDERA (voice-over): Serhey is stoic as we talked about surviving the Russian siege, but there's one question that pierces his heart.

(on camera): Do you worry about your grandchildren witnessing this war?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I don't have words for that. Do you understand?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): The little ones can forget, but the older ones will remember always.

LAVANDERA (voice-over): Grandfather and father note their children will never be the same.

(on camera): Why do you feel it was important to be here at this moment?

ONUFRIENKO (through translator): So people can see for themselves. The whole world should see how the Russian world comes and kill civilians for nothing.

LAVANDERA: When you get older, what do you think you'll remember about this moment in this day?

ONUFRIENKO (through translator): I will remember everything. I will remember every day. And I will tell my children and my grandchildren. I will remember this all my life.

LAVANDERA (voice-over): He's a teenager who refuses to look away from the raw reality of this war.

Ed Lavandera, CNN, Borodyanka, Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: Stories like that are so hard to watch, but it's so important that the world knows.

We have got tapes, and they don't lie, Kevin McCarthy in his own words after January 6 discussing plans to ask then-President Trump to resign. And that's not all.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:26:37]

CABRERA: Just into CNN, newly leaked audio of top House Republican Kevin McCarthy days after the January 6 Capitol attack.

He makes a stunning admission about a conversation he had with then- President Trump.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): But let me be very clear to all of you, and I've been very clear to the president. He bears responsibility for his words and actions, no ifs, ands or buts.

I asked him personally today, does he hold responsibility for what happened? Does he feel bad about what happened? And he told me he does have some responsibility for what happened. And he need to acknowledge that.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

CABRERA: Now, this follows last night's bombshell audio of McCarthy on January 10 saying he was going to urge Trump to resign.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

MCCARTHY: The only discussion I would have with him is that I think this will pass. And it will be my recommendation you should resign.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

CABRERA: Let's bring in CNN's Lauren Fox and Melanie Zanona.

Melanie, you have learned McCarthy and Trump actually spoke last night about that second recording we just played. How did that go?

MELANIE ZANONA, CNN CAPITOL HILL REPORTER: Well, it appears that Kevin McCarthy's attempts at damage control have actually worked.

My sources told me that they spoke last night after this bombshell reporting from "The New York Times," and that Trump actually was not upset with McCarthy, at least in part because McCarthy never actually followed through with his plans to advise Trump to resign in the immediate days after January 6.

And we should also point out that McCarthy has worked very hard to stay in the former president's good graces over the last year. Now, he's not out of the woods yet. We should also point out that Trump's Hill allies want to hear directly from the president before they decide how to proceed.

And they're also bracing for other potential shoes to drop. "The New York Times" also reported that McCarthy in the immediate aftermath of the attacks said some other Republican lawmakers' Twitter accounts should be taken away. That could be really problematic from him. We have not heard that audio yet.

So, we will be tracking all of this. And McCarthy is going to have a lot to answer for when House Republican -- gathers for their weekly conference meeting next week. CABRERA: Indeed.

In the category of more shoes to drop, Lauren, there is more audio out today, apparently more on the way. What else was revealed?

LAUREN FOX, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, there's really a contradiction and what McCarthy was saying publicly and what he was saying privately.

Listen to what he told Republican members about the fact that he'd really had it with the former president.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

MCCARTHY: All right, I know this is not fun. I know this is not great. I know this is very tough.

But what I want to do, especially through here, is, I don't want to rush things. I want everybody to have all the information needed. I have had it with this guy. What he did is unacceptable. Nobody can defend that. And nobody should defend it.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

FOX: And just a few days later, on January 21, McCarthy was asked if the former president provoked those rioters to enter the Capitol by a reporter.

Here's what he was saying publicly.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Leader McConnell has said that President -- former President Trump and other important people provoked those folks -- those folks to come to the Capitol.

Do you believe that President -- former President Trump provoked?

MCCARTHY: I don't believe he provoked, if you listen to what he said at the rally.

(END VIDEO CLIP)