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Ukraine Paramedics Work To Save Lives; Meadows Texts Revealed; Nataliya Gumenyuk Is Interviewed About Ukraine. Aired 9:30-10a

Aired April 26, 2022 - 09:30   ET

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

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[09:30:42]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: We are getting new glimpse today of what life -- what the danger is like for people trapped in cities close to Ukraine's front line. Just look at these images of hundreds of people hunkered down in Kharkiv's metro stations, which have become bomb shelters. Beds, lines for donated food.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: In that city, rescue workers face increasing danger as they try to save lives.

CNN's Clarissa Ward travelled with a paramedic team in Kharkiv and found herself in the middle of the fire.

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CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): For paramedics Alexandra Rudkovskaya and Vladimir Venzel, they prepare their ambulance for the carnage that Kharkiv residents confront every day.

We have two tourniquets, Vladimir says.

Alexandra's mother stops by the dispatch center to give her daughter a hug. This is one of the most dangerous jobs. Every moment together is precious.

A loud stream of booms signals the day's work is beginning.

That's incoming now, this ambulance worker tells us.

Alexandra and Vladimir answer the call. Temperatoura (ph), she says, the code used when someone has been wounded by shelling.

Their flak jackets on, they're ready to roll out.

WARD (on camera): So, they've said that they got reports one person at least has been injured in the shelling and they're hearing some rockets as well. So we're going to see what's going on.

WARD (voice over): The shells hit a residential apartment building. The paramedics need to act fast. Russian forces are increasingly hitting the same target twice. It's called a double tap. It's a horrifying strategy to take out rescue workers as they respond. As we see for ourselves.

Get in, Vladimir shouts. Faster, faster, faster.

We take cover under the stairwell. Alexandra is trying to find the wounded person, but there's no signal.

At that moment, another barrage goes off. We brace for the impact.

Is everybody OK, Alexandra asks.

Our team member, Maria Abdava (ph), has cut up her hands on broken glass. Vladimir treats her injuries, as Alexandra calls the dispatch again to find where the wounded are.

We've got no connection. We're sitting in the entrance, she says. And they're shelling the shit out of us.

The connection keeps dropping.

Finally, she gets through to the person who called for the ambulance.

Tell me your damn house number, she says! I repeat, 12G. I've told you a thousand times, he replies. The man is dying.

We decide to try to make a run for it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Maria, maria, come on! Come on, Maria! Come on! Go! Go! Get in the car. Get in the car. (INAUDIBLE).

The ambulance was hit, yes?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

WARD (on camera): OK. So, we were just in an apartment building. They were looking for an injured man.

[09:35:01]

A bunch of rounds came in and hit the next-door building. So now we are getting out as fast as we can.

WARD (voice over): While we run out, Vladimir and Alexandra run back in. We find them treating the injured man on the side of the road. Their back window has been blown out by the blasts.

He has shrapnel injuries and head trauma. Once they've stabilized him, they rush him to the hospital.

Vladimir asks about his pain. The man has been deafened by the blast.

Arriving at the hospital, they've done their part. It's up to others now to save him. WARD (on camera): I have to say, I think you guys are like the bravest

people I have ever met.

WARD (voice over): Back at base, we ask them why they continue to do this work with all the danger it entails.

It's normal. This is our work. Of course it's scary, like for everyone, Alexandra says. Today you were with us in the hottest place, in the oven, but we're still alive, thank God.

WARD (on camera): (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

WARD (voice over): You feel it's your duty or obligation, Vladimir tells us, to help the people who are still here.

WARD (on camera): And what do your parents say? What does your family say? Aren't they wanting you to stop this work (ph)?

VENZEL (on camera): No comment. No comment. It's very difficult answering.

WARD: They must be scared?

VENZEL: Yes. Yes.

WARD: Proud, but scared.

VENZEL: (INAUDIBLE). All day. All night.

RUDKOVSKAYA (on camera): (INAUDIBLE).

WARD: We saw your mother.

RUDKOVSKAYA: Yes.

WARD: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

RUDKOVSKAYA: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

WARD: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

RUDKOVSKAYA: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

WARD (voice over): She's worried to the point of hysteria, Alexandra tells us. She says you need to leave. You need to go to some safe place. Why are you doing this? I have only one child. Stop it.

WARD (on camera): And what do you say?

WARD (voice over): I have to do it, she says simply.

And with that, they go back to cleaning their ambulance. Their shift only halfway through.

Clarissa Ward, CNN, Kharkiv.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GOLODRYGA: Incredible that these young paramedics can laugh after the day that they just had.

Our thanks to Clarissa for that important reporting.

Well, up next, exclusive reporting after CNN obtained thousands of texts that former President Trump's chief of staff sent and received about overturning the 2020 election. The most alarming texts, we'll show you, up next.

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[09:42:13]

GOLODRYGA: A New York judge is holding former President Trump in civil contempt for not complying with the subpoena and turning over documents to the state's attorney general. Trump has also been ordered to pay $10,000 a day until he complies. Lawyers with the AG's office say Trump has failed to produce, quote, even a single responsive document related to the tax fraud investigation of the Trump Organization. Lawyers for the former president say he plans to appeal the judge's ruling.

Well, in exclusive new reporting this morning, CNN has obtained more than 2,000 text messages from former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows that reveal just how far former President Trump's inner circle tried to go to overturn the 2020 election. The never before seen texts, which were handed over to the January 6th committee, include messages from Trump's family, Fox News hosts, the MyPillow CEO, and current and former Republican members of Congress.

Here with me now is CNN editor at large and politics reporter Chris Cillizza to discuss this further.

Chris, so you point out one particularly interesting exchange between Meadows and Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. What does it reveal?

CHRIS CILLIZZA, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Yes, Bianna, now there are, as you said, more than 2,000 texts. So there's a lot in there. But I just want to highlight a couple here because I think they really stand out.

All right, so this is the one you mentioned. I want you to particularly notice the date. January 17th. OK, so three days before the inauguration, 11 days after January 6th.

In our private chat with only members, several are saying the only way to save our republic is for Trump to call for marshall -- she means martial, m-a-r-t-i-a-l, not m-a-r -- it's not named after anyone named marshall -- martial law. I don't know on those things. I just wanted you to tell him, they stole this election. We all know it. Et cetera. Et cetera.

OK, three days before the next president was to be inaugurated, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and as she said in a chat with only members, so other members of Congress are saying that Donald Trump should invoke martial law. Essentially taking civilian authority away and handing it over to the military. I just think that this speaks to the fact that we were very close to the official transition of power.

We were months removed from the election. We were just days removed from the insurrection, violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, and still members of Congress, including Marjorie Taylor Greene, were having conversations with the White House chief of staff that suggested we should put the military in charge to keep Donald Trump in office. I just think that speaks to where the Republican Party was and, candidly, is.

GOLODRYGA: Right. And this comes as we are seeing Greene testify, right, in a case in Georgia.

CILLIZZA: Yes

GOLODRYGA: Asked about her role in the January 6th insurrection, where she repeatedly says she doesn't recall anything she said, anything that she texts, any of this. And this is quite striking then to see in such detail, just a year ago, some of the text messages that she sent to the chief of staff.

CILLIZZA: And, Bianna, just to -- just to -- Bianna, just to add to your point, she was specifically asked last Friday whether or not she advocated for the use of martial law and said I don't remember.

[09:45:07]

It seems to me this was not 20 years ago, this was, you know, a year ago.

GOLODRYGA: Yes.

CILLIZZA: It seems to me you would remember that. But, anyway, to your point.

GOLODRYGA: Yes. Well, also that stood out to you among the 2,000 texts was an exchange between Meadows and former Texas Governor Rick Perry, which he had previously denied were his.

What do those messages show?

CILLIZZA: Right. So by way of a little bit of context. In December of last year, Jake Tapper and our colleagues reported that Meadows' phone had been linked to a bunch of messages sent to -- excuse me, Perry's phone had been linked to a bunch of messages sent to Meadows right after the election in which there was advocacy for ways in which to contest the election. Rick Perry, though his spokesman, denied that. He was the secretary of energy during the Obama -- Trump administration.

Here's just one. We have clearly the data driven program that can clearly show where the fraud was committed. This is the silver bullet. November 7, 2020.

Now, I highlight this because, remember, Perry's spokesman denied that he had sent this. The problem, these texts were signed. Signed by who? Rick Perry. So, not only were they from a phone directly tied to Rick Perry, they were also signed Rick Perry. Rick Perry hasn't offered any comment, but it seems, Bianna, he's caught in a pretty bold-faced lie.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, Rick Perry, the same man who I believe in 2016 called Trump a cancer to the Republican Party.

CILLIZZA: Right.

GOLODRYGA: Quite a lot has changed in those four years.

Chris Cillizza, thank you.

CILLIZZA: Thanks, Bianna.

GOLODRYGA: Well, up ahead, a Ukrainian journalist predicts the battle for the Donbas will be especially brutal given what we've seen already in Mariupol and Bucha. We'll speak with that journalist, up next.

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[09:51:14]

GOLODRYGA: The U.N. refugee agency says nearly 8.5 million Ukrainians are expected to leave the country because of Russia's invasion.

SCIUTTO: CNN's Sam Kiley was in the Donbas yesterday as families who had been trying to hold out finally decided to leave and said some tearful goodbyes. But he also spoke to one woman who works in a local power plant, says she's not going anywhere.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): We're not planning to leave here. This is my homeland. And my relatives are here. I cannot leave anyone here. My elderly grandmother is 80 and can hardly walk. I can't leave her. Do you understand?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Never easy to make that choice to leave. And even when your life hangs in the balance.

Joining us now, Nataliya Gumenyuk. She's a Ukrainian journalist, co- founder of Public Interest Journalism Lab.

Natalia, you wrote about the Donbas region for "The Atlantic" and you said the Donbas, which has already paid the heaviest price of the past eight years of conflict, has yet more pain to come. People also forget this war began in 2014 and there's been a lot of fighting in Donbas.

When you look at images of Bucha and the devastation that Russian forces wrought there, do people in the east have to prepare for the same?

NATALIYA GUMENYUK, INDEPENDENT JOURNALIST: Hi. So indeed it's something to be prepared, but probably even different. It's more about the Mariupol scenario when the cities are just destroyed with the artillery shelling. And that's, in fact, something which is already happening.

The Ukrainian president, Zelenskyy, more or less, announced that the battle of the Donbas started a week ago. The Russia has been preparing this assault for more than a month. It's probably a bit hard to grasp for the journalist because it looks different because we're thinking about quite a large territory and the front line is more or less 300 miles. And that's where all across this territory, on the towns, it's industrial area, the fighting takes place. So, it's not really like one place (ph) to be bombed.

But what I understood also from talking to the Ukrainian military generals, they do explain that the Russia changed its strategy. So the earlier they tried, as in Bucha and elsewhere, to occupy the towns, and then to move forward, they understand that this is not something they are successful, so they are first shelling the towns, managing them to destroy like more or less the scourged earth tactics as it's called, and then to move on. That's something we saw already happening in the Luhansk region.

But, again, because it's such a scale, it's very hard to see it in one place.

GOLODRYGA: Yes. And you mentioned that those who have been involved in the massacres in Bucha have been rewarded and promoted by the Russian military just to give a sense of what we could possibly see transpire there at the direction of the Russian military in Donbas. So it was really interesting because you spoke to the two governors of Luhansk and Donetsk and you pick up on an issue that I don't think people focus enough on, and that is the generational gap between leadership in the two countries.

These governors, one is 35, the other is 46. President Zelenskyy is 44. Vladimir Putin will be turning 70 in October. All of those around him are roughly his same age, too. Talk about that change in generation and the impact that is having on Ukraine's struggle here given that it's relatively young leadership.

GUMENYUK: Indeed. And I'm speak -- I have spoken also to a lot of mayors and people who are in power in Ukraine. But in particular, it's -- I mean -- well, my -- my story was really about those people whose shoulders, there is such a difficult -- who should make this incredible choices.

[09:55:07]

You know, call people to (INAUDIBLE) to understand they are not military, but they are in coordination with the military. And it's true, often Vladimir Putin refer, you know, to the nostalgia for the Soviet Union. The governor of Donetsk region, you know, he's been a force really when the Soviet Union was collapsed. So, quite a lot of Ukrainians grew up with totally different, you know, way of thinking about the past, about relation to Russia and the Soviet nostalgia. So, of course, it just doesn't work with them. But something also to

mention. It's probably also explained why Ukrainians are partially that determined in this war because it's just the beginning of their life.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

GUMENYUK: They really feel -- a professional life I'm speaking. You know, they feel it's something to pursue and go forward.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

GUMENYUK: But it's a whole life in front of them.

GOLODRYGA: Yes.

SCIUTTO: Nataliya Gumenyuk, thanks so much for the hard but important work that you're doing.

GUMENYUK: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: In about 30 minutes, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, he will join us live from Ramstein Air Base for an exclusive interview. What can he share after today's meet with defense counterparts from around the globe? What is the latest U.S. view of the war here in Ukraine?

That's coming up.

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