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Uvalde, Texas, School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo Resigns From His Seat On City Council In Wake Of Elementary School Shooting; Former President Trump Reportedly Considering Announcing His 2024 Presidential Bid; Secret Service Rumors Support Testimony Of Cassidy Hutchinson Before House January 6th Committee On Former President Trump's Behavior During January 6th Riots; Texas Supreme Court Allows Enforcement Of Abortion Law From 1925; Flights Cancelled Across U.S. At Beginning Of July 4th Holiday Weekend; Pilots For Delta Airlines Demonstrate Due To Overwork; Documentary Looks At Recent Negative Treatment Of Press In Democracies Around The World. Aired 2- 3p ET

Aired July 02, 2022 - 14:00   ET

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

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[14:08:00]

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

And this just in, more than a month after the Uvalde school massacre, the embattled school district police chief has reportedly resigned from his seat on the city council. That's according to "The Uvalde Leader News." Pete Arredondo has faced mounting criticism amid revelations that officers waited in the school's hallways for 80 minutes before they breached a classroom door and confronted the gunman. Nineteen children and two teachers were killed in that mass shooting and relatives of the victims have said they believe some lives could have been saved had officers acted sooner.

In a statement about his resignation, Arredondo wrote, quote, "The mayor, the city council, and the city staff must continue to move forward without distractions. I feel this is the best decision for Uvalde." And we'll, of course, continue to follow this story and bring you more updates as they come in.

Today, sources within the Secret Service are backing up the bombshell testimony from a former Trump White House aide that an irate President Trump demanded to go to the Capitol on January 6th. Since Cassidy Hutchinson went under oath, there has been an ongoing campaign by Trump and his allies to discredit her testimony about what she saw and heard on January 6th.

CNN has now spoken with two Secret Service employees who both say they also heard about a confrontation inside the presidential SUV that day, a story they say spread widely around the agency in the weeks and months that followed January 6th. They say Trump indeed demanded to be taken to the Capitol, and when the Secret Service said no to the trip, Trump berated his security detail, saying something to the effect of -- I'm the effing president of the United States, you can't tell me what to do.

The other concerning development is the new information about who may have been pressuring Hutchinson ahead of her sworn testimony. A source tells CNN one person who may have tried to influence her did so at the behest of then White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. The January 6th committee giving us a taste of the pressure campaign.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. LIZ CHENEY, (R-WY) VICE CHAIR, JANUARY 6 SELECT COMMITTEE: This is a call received by one of our witnesses. Quote, "A person let me know you have your deposition tomorrow. He wants me to let you know he's thinking about you. He knows you're loyal and you're going to do the right thing when you go in for your deposition."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And joining me now, CNN law enforcement analyst and former Secret Service agent Jonathan Wackrow. Jonathan, good to have you here on this important story. And you know this subject all too well. If something like this did happen in that presidential SUV, how quickly do you think that kind of confrontation, that episode, word of that episode would travel within the agency? You and I both know people do talk inside the Secret Service.

Jonathan, are you there? Can you hear me?

JONATHAN WACKROW, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yes, I can't hear any programming.

ACOSTA: You can't hear -- can you hear me?

All right, we'll get back to Jonathan Wackrow in just a moment. We'll put Jonathan on pause as we move to a different story.

With more potentially damaging hearings about the January 6th attacks happening later this month, CNN has learned that former president Donald Trump could launch a 2024 bid pretty much at any time, deviating from an original plan to announce after the midterm elections in November. CNN reporter Gabby Orr joins me now.

Gabby, we were just trying to go to Jonathan Wackrow a few moments ago. We're going to try to get him back in a few moments here. But let's talk about this very important development, which is, apparently Trump may want to jump into the 2024 race this early. What are you hearing from your sources?

GABBY ORR, CNN REPORTER: Yes, well, for the past few months, Trump has been asking his advisers when would be the best time for him to launch a third presidential campaign. And what we've been told over the last week is that the time is now. He has been eagerly awaiting a campaign announcement, and that could come possibly as soon as this month, potentially.

I'm told by a number of advisers that there are really three reasons that are sort of accelerating this timeline for the former president. The first is, as you mentioned, the revelations that have come out of the public testimony that we've heard from the January 6th committee. They have been much more damaging than Trump's team anticipated.

And he really wants to change the narrative, to shift it back to him and what his presidential campaign would look like, the policies that he would be including on a presidential platform. So that's one way to sort of draw attention away from the January 6th Committee and back into politics.

The second reason is that he wants to clear the field. My colleague Melanie Zanona was told this is a primary reason that he wants to move forward and announce a campaign. He wants to put potential Republican rivals on notice. And that particularly applies to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis who has really emerged as sort of a hero among cultural conservatives and probably the biggest threat to Trump if he does decide to run against him in a Republican primary.

[14:05:06]

And the third reason is that he wants to take advantage of the moment that we're in right now. We've seen some polling about President Joe Biden's approval ratings and how Americans feel about the direction of the country. And Trump really feels like people are concerned about their pocketbooks right now, and maybe less concerned about his personality. And so this could be an opportune moment, he feels, to jump into the race.

ACOSTA: Well, it's interesting to hear that he's weighing what Ron DeSantis is going to do. I think the Florida governor is probably going to run for president regardless of what Trump ultimately decides. Of course, we're going to have to keep an eye on that. And obviously, Trump has the January 6th investigation looming over him. And whether or not Merrick Garland, the attorney general, decides ultimately to indict him, maybe Trump wants to get ahead of that. Gabby Orr, thank you very much.

Let's go to former Secret Service agent Jonathan Wackrow. Jonathan, we were just trying to talk to you about this devastating testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson during the January 6th hearing earlier this week, and then late yesterday CNN was able to confirm through a couple of Secret Service sources that yes, Trump was angrily confronting his agents in that presidential SUV on that day. When the agents said no, he went off on them. And they essentially are backing up what Cassidy Hutchinson said. I guess your reaction to that, Jonathan?

WACKROW: Jim, you've been covering Trump for a long time. Did we expect anything less from the former president on that day? To hear how angry he was for not being allowed to go to the U.S. Capitol, he had said during his speech on that day, he had indicated many times his intent was to go with his followers to the U.S. Capitol, and here you had the Secret Service saying no to the sitting president of the United States.

And I think that that anger that we're hearing from former, or current Secret Service agents, as well as the testimony actually is overshadowing what I feel is a much bigger point. Why did the Secret Service not take the former president to the U.S. Capitol? And the reason being is because they did a quick threat assessment of the operational environment there and they determined that the likelihood of increased violence plus the consequences that could be associated with bringing the president there were too high. The threat environment was escalating, and it was unsafe to bring the president there.

That's the point that we should be focusing in on, because that determination was made well in advance of the U.S. Capitol actually being breached. Why wasn't additional resources put towards the vice president who was at that location at the time? That's the question that I want answered.

ACOSTA: No, that's a good question. And also, what about Trump apparently saying, according to Cassidy Hutchinson, remember, she's the one who testified under oath, there are so many of these other high level Trump officials, you name it, I guess they're too afraid to go in and testify under oath because what may happen to them, but she testifies under oath that Trump is saying I don't care if they have weapons, get rid of the mags. What does the Secret Service do in a situation like that?

WACKROW: Listen, this actually -- the Secret Service as an institution that day was tested. The protective methodology was tested. Here you have the president of the United States saying take the mags down, let these individuals into my sight that we know now have weapons, right?

ACOSTA: Right.

WACKROW: But the Secret Service isn't going to allow that. They said no, we're not doing that, we're not taking you to an environment that is unsafe. The protective methodology and the approach that they take stood its ground on that day. Just think about the enormous political pressure that those Secret Service agents and supervisors were under that day to say no. And they did the right thing. And I think that's an important fact to acknowledge at this point in time.

ACOSTA: It's almost like they were protecting the office of the president of the United States from the president of the United States, essentially.

WACKROW: That's exactly it. You're keying in on something that we've said for a long time. Secret Service agents protect the president but also the office of the presidency.

And Jonathan, Cassidy Hutchinson says she heard this story from then White House deputy chief of staff for operations Tony Ornato. There's a photograph of him there. Our sources say he denies it. But I want to ask you about Tony Ornato, because prior to taking that job, he had been in the Secret Service for years, worked very close to Donald Trump, then became a political appointee in the Trump White House as a deputy chief of staff under Donald Trump, and now he's back with the Secret Service.

Do you think it's appropriate for somebody like that to go back and forth from the Secret Service position to a political position back to the Secret Service, when the Secret Service is supposed to be apolitical?

[14:10:09]

WACKROW: Yes, this is a big question. I know that a lot of agents are talking about that. It's very hard to maintain your independence when you were a political appointee. And I think this is a very unique situation that Tony has put the Secret Service in. They have to defend somebody while they were in a political role, not under the operational control of the Secret Service. It's very difficult.

And I want to just take that as an outlier. That is not the norm. So for the viewers, this is a very individual issue.

But I think that we're seeing the integrity of the Secret Service be -- come into question now. But I believe in the institutional integrity of the Secret Service and their motto, worthy in trust and confidence. Tony is an outlier in this situation. It is not representative of the women and men every single day that are out there providing that protection to our governmental leaders.

ACOSTA: And I understand what you're saying all too well about the professionalism of the Secret Service. I was at the White House for eight years, got to work closely with them, and had just enormous admiration for so many of them. And a few years ago, I had the opportunity, Jonathan, to see firsthand the intense training that the Secret Service agents go through. We're watching some of the video from a piece I did back in July of 2015.

How do you think the attack on the Capitol will impact their training going forward, since we've never had a situation like this before? There I am riding with some officers as they're doing some of these driving exercises. I got to see all of this firsthand. It's impressive what the agents go through in their training. And yet because of this Trump experience, as you were saying earlier, the agency had been tested during those years.

WACKROW: Listen, there's a saying in the Secret Service, complacency kills. And the agency will never become complacent because they always have to outpace the threat environment. Threats these days are dynamic and unpredictable, and the Secret Service has to be ready for every eventuality.

And to that point, what they do, is they do after-action reports. They're constantly looking back at what happened during a critical incident and get better. And here when I think they look back on January 6th, they're going to see there were communication breakdowns. Think about what I had said before. An assessment was made that it was too dangerous to bring the president to the U.S. Capitol.

But we had our number two protectee there, the vice president. So what did we do to bolster the protection there in that moment? Were there information flows going back and forth instantaneous to talk about this deterioration or this inbound threat to the U.S. Capitol?

I think that's what needs to be focused in on right now, and that's going to make the agency better, but it's also going to make all law enforcement partners in the national Capitol region better for it as well.

ACOSTA: Right, in particular, when there is conversation going on inside the administration, inside the White House with the vice president's team, they're worried about the vice president's safety. If you're protecting not only the peaceful transfer of power but also the line of succession, you have two different things happening at once that day. My goodness, what a task for the Secret Service to deal with that day. Jonathan Wackrow, thank you very much, we appreciate it.

WACKROW: Thanks, Jim.

ACOSTA: And coming up, a major loss for abortion rights activists in Texas after the state supreme court allows a century-old abortion ban dating back to 1925, if you can believe that, to go into effect. We'll talk about that in just a few minutes. Reaction from Texas is next.

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[14:17:51]

ACOSTA: Today abortion is again banned in Texas. A late Friday night ruling by the state supreme court overturned a lower court ruling that had temporarily blocked the ban. It said Texas can enforce its abortion ban from 1925. Abortion providers can face lawsuits and financial penalties if they perform the procedure.

And joining me is Poppy Northcutt, a NASA engineer turned lawyer fighting for women's reproductive rights. Poppy, thank you so much. You're now a referral lawyer for Jane's Due Process, and the president of Texas NOW, an organization that works to achieve equality for women.

And you were at a Houston women's clinic helping to escort patients seeking abortions at that facility when the news came out that Roe versus Wade was overturned. What was your reaction to this ruling by the Texas Supreme Court? I guess you're not that surprised, but the law going all the way back to 1925 now, it's just extraordinary.

POPPY NORTHCUTT, REFERRAL LAWYER, JANE'S DUE PROCESS: It is extraordinary, but I wasn't really surprised. I wouldn't expect anything good for abortion rights or civil rights of any kind to come out of the Texas Supreme Court. It's dominated nine to zero by Republicans. And the chief judge himself is well-known as a very vocal opponent of abortion rights for a long time.

ACOSTA: And there is this back and forth with the lower court blocking the ban, and now the Texas Supreme Court allowing it. As a lawyer, do you feel like you're out of options now, particularly after what the Supreme Court did?

NORTHCUTT: Well, I'm not the lawyer on that case. I'm sure that the ACLU and the Center for Reproductive Rights are looking at options beyond the Texas Supreme Court. The only other option is to look at the federal courts. It looks bleak, there's no doubt about it, because even if you get a favorable ruling out of the district court, federal district court, then you're heading immediately to the Fifth Circuit, which is as bad or worse on this issue as the United States Supreme Court or the Texas Supreme Court.

[14:20:05]

ACOSTA: And Poppy, what has been the reaction from women in your state, just in general, about what has taken place, this right that they had for so many years in this country just all of a sudden being stripped away?

NORTHCUTT: Well, some people are very angry, and some are very sad, some are in clear distress at the moment. For months now we've had women having to leave the state to go elsewhere because of the six- week ban that was put in place by our legislature. So it's been very, very hard on women in Texas.

And the people that are the most adversely affected of all are undocumented women because they can't get on a plane and travel. And then also teenagers who can't feel like they can about their parents in this decision. So it's a devastating blow to women.

ACOSTA: And the attorney general of Texas, Ken Paxton, tweeted in response to this court ruling, we can show it onscreen, "Pro-life victory," he tweeted. "Thanks to my appeal, the Supreme Court of Texas has slapped down the abortion providers and the district courts carrying their water." Poppy, what do you have to say to the attorney general of Texas?

NORTHCUTT: I think the attorney general of Texas should go to court and face his own criminal charges instead of running around talking about criminal charges for other people.

ACOSTA: And what happens now? You've been working with some of these facilities there in Houston. What advice can you give?

NORTHCUTT: Well, at the moment, the best advice is to deal with this at the ballot box. I'm registering voters. I'm going out at 3:00 this afternoon and registering voters. We've got to solve it at the election in November. There's really no other option in terms of a significant fix, realistically. You can talk about the federal level codifying Roe v. Wade, but they don't have the votes to do that.

We've got to get more people in the U.S. Senate, and we've got to hold on to the House, and all of that still comes back to November. And a lot could be achieved in November if, in Texas, for example, a new attorney general, a new lieutenant governor, a new governor. So people need to register, they need to show up, and they need to vote.

ACOSTA: All right, Poppy Northcutt, thank you very much for your time this afternoon, we really appreciate it.

NORTHCUTT: Happy to be with you.

ACOSTA: Thank you.

Coming up, the Fourth of July travel rush, hundreds of flights canceled today as millions head out for the long holiday weekend. And spoiler alert, it's a lot of hurry up and wait.

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[14:27:38]

ACOSTA: If you're flying for the holiday weekend, prepare for long lines and delays. A perfect storm of surging demand, staffing shortages, and bad weather is causing massive travel headaches. More than 600 flights have already been cancelled today in the United States. More than 2,700 flights delayed. I hope they're not yours. CNN's Camila Bernal is at LAX in Los Angeles for us, the big Los Angeles airport. Camila, hopefully no fireworks at the airport for you this weekend. I'm sure there's a lot of frustrations there among some passengers.

CAMILA BERNAL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Jim. And look, I've been here to witness the faces of people whose flights have been canceled. Thankfully, though, things appear to be running smoothly here at LAX. So far out of this airport, 13 flights have been cancelled in comparison to the more than 600 that have been canceled nationwide to date. But every time we check that number is a just little bit higher.

And look, you are going to need more time. If you take a look behind me, you're going to see more people waiting in line, waiting to get their bags checked in, waiting to go through security. But that's because more and more people are traveling. TSA is saying that they screened 2.4 million people on Friday. That's the highest number that they've seen since February of 2020.

The TSA spokesperson confirming these numbers and saying that we are back to pre-pandemic checkpoint volume. It is incredible just to think about the fact that we are essentially back to that pre-pandemic era, and you're seeing those passengers coming here to LAX. We spoke to one of them who told us that he has been flying to work, and said that he did have a delay but is trying to stay positive. Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

I would say most of all just the people working at the airport, they try their best to take care of it and accommodate. But nothing too bad. You just have to sit at the airport for a little longer, get an extra cup of coffee type of thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERNAL: Now, a lot of people, though, preferring not to pay for an expensive coffee at the airport and instead choosing to drive on this holiday weekend. We are expecting 42 million people to travel by car this weekend, in comparison to 3.55 million expected to travel by plane and 2.42 million by other means.

[14:30:03]

This just goes to show that people are traveling, they're wanting to be out spending time with their friends and families. But at the airport, though, there could be more challenges in the near future as more people decide to travel because a lot of these airlines are just struggling to hire the people they need to deal with this influx, Jim.

ACOSTA: All right, and we can see it in these live pictures that we're watching right now of all these cars lining up to get into LAX. Pack some patience over this holiday weekend, you'll need it. Camila Bernal, thank you very much.

And joining me is the Points Guy himself, Brian Kelly. Brian, you've been tracking all of this chaos that has been happening at the airports the last several days. You know this all too well. So if you're a traveler who just wants to go to their vacation, what's your best piece of advice?

BRIAN KELLY, FOUNDER OF THEPOINTSGUY.COM: You've got to be proactive. I flew yesterday from L.A. to New York. And I track all of my flights on FlightAware. Get the app, it's free. You can set an alert for your flight. And often, I get alerts that my flight's been delayed before the airline.

And these days, everything is critical, getting that information first. And frankly, I do backup reservations. If my flight starts to get canceled or delayed, I've got a reservation made for later in the day, fully refundable, so if my flight does actually gets cancelled, I have got a backup option, and I've snagged it before everyone else on my flight.

ACOSTA: OK, so you're doing four-dimensional chess here. It's just not fair to the rest of us who aren't as you are. And you're probably using some points, too. Don't kid around here. But Brian, when it comes to flights that are overbooked, there are reports of an airline offering passengers $10,000 to bump to a different flight. I've heard some high dollar figures in those kinds of situations, but not $10,000. I guess in situations when they're overbooked. If you find yourself in a similar situation, how much are you entitled to?

KELLY: You're not entitled to anything. Airlines can bump you off, they avoid that involuntary bumping. They got in trouble a couple of years ago. I would always say always negotiate directly and nicely with the gate agent. Make sure they like you. Don't be combative with them, because they have total power how much money they give you. so I would always think about what you want. Over $1,000 isn't rare these days. And also when they rebook you, make sure they put you in first class. They 100 percent have the power to do that if there's an open seat.

ACOSTA: Oh, that's interesting. And I don't know why the airlines aren't forced to do what they have to do over in Europe, when you get into a situation where you've been delayed for many hours, it's a requirement there in the E.U., isn't it, that they have to send you a check?

KELLY: Yes, they do. And actually today, there's 50 percent delays on Air France, KLM. So for all Americans or anyone traveling in Europe, and there's delays, look up "E.U. 261 compensation." Those are the E.U. laws regulating those carriers. Even if you're flying an American carrier from the E.U. to the U.S. and your flight is delayed or cancelled, you're owed cash compensation. In the U.S. we don't have those rules. But if the airline delays or cancels your flight, take the money. Do not take a voucher. Sometimes they'll just try to give you a voucher. Don't take it.

And also, if your flight is delayed or cancelled, ask your credit card company that you booked the flight on, AMEX, Chase, Capital One, they all have flight delay and cancellation coverage. So even if you're out for rental car and hotels, the airlines are broke. Go to the credit card company for reimbursement.

ACOSTA: Oh, interesting. And the airlines got $54 billion in federal assistance during the peak of COVID-19. But this week we saw Delta pilots picketing, saying they're exhausted from keeping up with the high demand. What's going on here? What happened?

KELLY: Yes, airlines got greedy. So they were making boatloads of cash before the pandemic. Instead of saving it for a rainy day, what did they do? Stockholder buybacks to line the pockets of their executives. Then the pandemic came, and they took money -- what they did was they early retired a lot of those expensive older pilots that were really -- because they did not forecast demand coming back this quick.

So they took taxpayer money, they thinned out their payrolls, they thought they were pretty clever until we're in the position we are today. And here is a news flash, you can't just hire a pilot off the street and get him up and running. You can't even do that for gate agents or ground workers at airports. So basically, they were woefully unprepared for this surge that we're seeing. And I'm an optimist in life, but things are not going to get better anytime soon.

ACOSTA: Goodness. All right, Brian, well, thanks so much for that. And it's a reminder to be as kind as possible with the flight attendants, the pilots, the gate agents, all of those folks are working really hard over this busy summer season. Brian, thanks so much, appreciate it.

[14:35:03]

And coming up, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Ronan Farrow, he's going to be joining us in just a few moments on his new documentary about the perils facing journalists worldwide.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In my 30 years of experience, I have not seen this amount of harassment. It's not even harassment. It's intimidation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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ACOSTA: Five years after Donald Trump declared the press the enemy of the people, the new documentary "Endangered" provides an unsettling and emotional look at how journalists in the United States and around the world are at growing risk because of disinformation and leaders who denigrate them. The film was executive produced by Ronan Farrow and is available now on HBO and HBO Max which share a parent company with CNN. Here is a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are live on the air at the moment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whoa, whoa, whoa.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you mind telling me why I'm under arrest, sir?

[14:40:01]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A reporter was just taken into police custody roar live on television.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As journalists, we can't let the truth down. We are moderators of fact.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Governments attacking journalists is not new.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look at all the fake news.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is happening widespread also.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The president of Brazil is saying that I'm a whore.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In the Constitution, freedom of the press is guaranteed. But the rules are changing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The problem is the lack of public trust in journalism.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm not going to buy a newspaper that doesn't reflect my views.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sometimes it feels like when you talk to people, you're living in two different realities.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you want to talk to me, you can take the mask off.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You can never tell what threats are going to materialize on the ground.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In my 30 years of experience, I have not seen this amount of harassment. It's not even harassment, it's intimidation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's very difficult to know if this is the end of an era or the beginning of something even more sinister.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Press freedom in the United States is starting to look like many other countries around the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP) ACOSTA: And joining me now is the executive producer for that documentary, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and contributing writer for "The New Yorker," Ronan Farrow. Ronan, so good to have you back, great to see you again. And this just looks so excellent. I really appreciate you tackling this subject. You profile journalists in the U.S., Mexico, Brazil for this film. This is a particular problem in Latin America, as you know. What was the experience of making this documentary like for you?

RONAN FARROW, PULITZER PRIZE WINNING JOURNALIST: Jim, it's always good to be on and talk to you. It's always good to do work that involves putting a spotlight on what we do in our profession, because that is not incidental to the biggest problems we face today. That is the foundation of any hope we have of preserving our rights. And there's a reason it's enshrined in the Constitution.

And this is not a project that takes a starry-eyed view of our profession. It doesn't suggest that it's perfect. It certainly doesn't suggest that it's beyond reproach or criticism. But it does chronicle how in this moment, every one of us who does confronting work, trying to create accountability, faces incoming, faces attacks. You've known that very well.

And when you couple that with a rise of a misinformation culture on social media, a rise in economic crises across our industry, you wind up with a situation where people are really at risk of not getting the facts and therefore are much more able to be manipulable in political processes, are must more vulnerable to their rights getting taken away.

So my experience of making this, the answer to that, is I drew a lot of strength from following the stories of several peers who were doing really good work and seeing, yes, here is the anatomy of the struggles that they face, but also here is how they persevere in the face of all of this.

ACOSTA: Yes, as the truth is under attack, journalists are under attack. It only goes that one would follow the other. And as part of the documentary, you follow a journalist from "The Guardian" named Oliver who was out covering the Trump campaign in 2020. I probably saw him from time to time. Here is a clip.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So the paper in Youngstown closed down recently, meaning that Youngstown is now the biggest city in America without a local newspaper. Are you upset by that?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No. It's just a sign of the times. They're a dying industry because they are so leftwing progressives. We are not leftwing progressives, so we stopped buying the newspaper. We stopped them just having one point of view, the Democrats. Why am I going to pay for a paper that calls me all kinds of names because I'm a conservative Republican? That's why they're a dying industry.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Don't you think, though, that this community has a right to have accountability journalism in it, though? Because that's what the function of that paper was, it was to hold the powerful to account.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, I don't believe they did. I'm not going to buy a newspaper that doesn't reflect my views.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: There you go -- I'm not going to buy a newspaper that doesn't reflect my view. Sums it up right there. And Ronan, later on, Oliver makes a point to say that the violence on January 6th was not an aberration but the culmination of Trump's five-year war on the press. But what he doesn't know is whether the insurrection marked the end of an era or the beginning of something more sinister. What you think do?

FARROW: I did a lot of work reporting on and profiling the rioters who were there on January 6th. That's since become the foundation of some of the arrest affidavits in those cases.

[14:45:03]

I in those conversations really felt acutely that link that he's talking about, that these were people who had become enraged at various facets of what was going on in the world, masking policies and so forth, partly because misinformation had flourished in news deserts that they lived in, partly because they were living in an algorithmically curated social media misinformation bubble where, as you heard that woman say, the sentiment was very much, I don't want to be in receipt of any facts that might shake up my worldview.

And I think that highlights how dangerous it is. Is it the beginning of a new, much worse era? Look, these are old tactics. Authoritarian leaders have been weaponizing misinformation, have been trying to alienate people from the press for a long time. But I think certainly we're in a moment of those tactics resurging, resurging at a time when the economics of our industry are also in peril, and that's chronicled in the film, too. We follow a wonderful "Miami Herald" photojournalist through the closing of some of their newsrooms and resources.

And I think we have got to pay more attention to that. And all of us as news consumers have to support sources of good and accurate news, and as voters have to push back on attacks on the free press, because they are not the enemy of the people. They are an important part of what's going to defend our rights in this country.

ACOSTA: No question about it. I like to think of journalists as defenders of the people, because there are people out there who are just being taken advantage of by people, bad faith actors who peddle lies. That's essentially what is happening across the board in so many parts of this country.

And Ronan, the overarching message seems to be that freedom of the press is no longer just a given, even in a democracy. What we saw during the Trump administration is they can intimidate, they can bully, they can push boundaries here or there, see if they can find a judge who will go along with them, that sort of thing. What do you want viewers to take away from this film?

FARROW: I think exactly the point you just made, that we can't take for granted the sanctity and integrity of the First Amendment in this country. We are at a moment where we're seeing tactics thrown against journalists, threats of even violence in some of these protests that we shot deployed against journalists, in a way that would have been unthinkable in the United States not that long ago.

And that is now increasingly the norm here. And there's a reason why we focused on the stories of journalists going through this difficult period of time in democracies across the Americas, because we're looking at countries with a shared set of challenges that have gotten worse in this respect in the current moment.

So I think we all need to be on guard. I would reiterate the point about, if you see good journalism out there that does challenge you and your assumptions and does introduce really hard facts into the conversation, if you see a "Pro Publica" piece that you like, you see a "New Yorker" piece you like, support that. Find ways to prop up these institutions, subscribe, subscribe, subscribe.

And push back in your day-to-day life and conversations that you're having if you care about this issue and if you value facts as a mechanism for creating accountability, because it is a subtle and pernicious thing that creeps into our culture over time when we have leaders and politicians saying these are the enemy of the people. We've all got to play our role, I think, pushing back on that. So the film is not a work of activism, but I think it does have those messages embedded in it.

ACOSTA: The documentary looks terrific, Ronan. It's called "Endangered." It's coming up on HBO, HBO Max. Ronan Farrow, thank you so much for your time. If we're going to care about our neighbors, our loved ones, and so on, part of that means making sure they're getting the truth. It's just as simple as that. And thank you so much for highlighting that. Really appreciate it.

FARROW: Amen to that, and thank you for all you do, Jim. Always a pleasure.

ACOSTA: Thank you, Ronan.

And we'll be right back.

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[14:53:42]

ACOSTA: The White House just announced President Biden will award the nation's highest civilian honors, the Medal of Freedom, to 17 new recipients. The list includes the most decorated American gymnast in history, Simone Biles, an advocate for victims of sexual abuse, soccer star Megan Rapinoe, who pushed for equal pay for women, former congresswoman and gun control activist Gabby Giffords, and Oscar winning actor Denzel Washington, a national spokesman for the Boys and Girls Club. In addition to that, the president will posthumously honor the late

Republican Senator John McCain and Apple cofounder Steve Jobs.

As a girl -- moving on, as a girl she heard doctors say she'd never walk again. As a woman she proved everyone wrong and became one of Hawaii's best adaptive surfers in today's "The Human Factor."

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When I paddled out the first time, I was really scared. But when I caught my first wave, the fire did not stop. My name is Mira (ph) Vanelson (ph), and I'm a para surfer. A para surfer is a disabled surfer or an adaptive surfer.

I was 14 when I got into an accident. This was back home in San Juan. I came to Hawaii, went to trainers. They fixed me up. I was paralyzed from the chest down. I was incomplete c6 broken spine.

[14:55:02]

I used the wheelchair for six years before I was able to walk with two canes. Now I'm just using one cane. I learned how to surf, and now I'm representing Hawaii in the worldwide competitions. It's a custom surfboard that is made for my disability. Nobody knows I'm disabled until I get out of the water, and I have to carry my surfboard while I'm holding a cane.

There is a lot, a lot of newly injured people, young people too, and those are the ones that I have to be positive for. It's OK if you hit rock bottom, but don't stay there. Keep fighting.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

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