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Trump Says He is Financially Supporting Some January 6 Defendants; Sexual Assault Reports in U.S. Military Jump by 13 Percent in 2021; South Carolina House Passes Near-Total Abortion Ban; Snap Inc., Bed Bath and Beyond, Ford are latest to Announce Layoffs. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired September 01, 2022 - 15:30   ET

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

[15:30:00]

SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Look at "The Wall Street Journal" today. Joe Biden is beating Donald Trump in head-to-head matchup today. If we nominate him again, we will lose.

ASHLEY ALLISON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: But I wonder, leadership in this moment would be when Kevin McCarthy gives his prebuttal to say what you just said, but he won't. Because he wants to not be the leader, he wants power and he wants to win. We could call it into this right now and it would require Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate saying it's a disgrace, it is a -- it should not happen. Donald Trump, you need to stop this rhetoric, but they won't. And that is not leadership.

JENNINGS: The average Republican voter, though, knows that this election can be about other issues. They don't believe they have to side with Joe Biden just to repudiate this. I think we won't find Republicans voting Democrat because they're mad about Trump. That's not going to happen.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: All right, we'll look ahead to the prebuttal. We look ahead for the speech for the president tonight. Ashley Allison, Scott Jennings thank you both.

All right, be sure to join CNN tonight for coverage of President Biden's primetime speech. It begins at 8:00 p.m. we'll be right back.

[15:35:00]

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ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: Reports of sexual assault within the U.S. military jumped by 13 percent last year, particularly in the Army, which is already struggling to meet recruiting goals.

BLACKWELL: CNN Pentagon reporter Oren Liebermann is here with more now. Oren, what do you know about this increase?

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Victor and Alisyn, this is certainly not the numbers the military was looking to see, especially with the emphasis Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has made on combating sexual assault. It was one of his top priorities right when he came in, and he said it's a scourge within the military that must be handled. Unfortunately, the numbers not only increase in report but a decrease in general reporting. All of those numbers right now going in the wrong direction.

As you point out, it's a 13 percent increase in reports from last year to the year before that. Certainly not what they wanted to see, especially with some of the steps they're working on taking, such as removing sexual assault investigation and prosecution from the chain of command, bringing in independent investigators and prosecutors. It has so far not had the effect they're hoping to see.

As you point out, the biggest increase is in the Army, where year- over-year the Army saw more than a 25 percent increase in reports of sexual assault. The Navy saw a 9 percent increase about, and then the Air Force and the Marine Corps both saw about a 2 percent increase in reports of sexual assault give or take there.

At the same time, the military also conducted a confidential survey to try to get a better sense of how widespread the problem is, how prevalent it is, not just looking at the number of reports that were filed but trying to do a military-wide survey, and there they say they believe there were nearly 36,000 cases of sexual assault based on this survey. The problem there, that means fewer and fewer members of the military are reporting sexual assaults to their authorities. They hope those numbers would go up. They'd see more reporting and fewer cases. Instead, Victor and Alisyn, right now they're seeing the opposite, more cases and fewer reports.

CAMEROTA: OK, Oren Liebermann thank you for that reporting.

BLACKWELL: Women in South Carolina are facing a new reality. The State House has passed, now the Senate is set to vote on a near total ban on abortion. It makes it a felony for anyone who violates it. Details are next.

[15:40:00]

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BLACKWELL: In South Carolina the State House of Representatives has just passed a near total ban on abortion and now heads to the Senate.

CAMEROTA: The bill was amended to include exceptions for rape and incest but only up to 12 weeks after conception. It also requires victims to file a police report.

Our next guest is Ann Warner. She's the CEO of the Women's Rights and Empowerment Network. And it was obviously this bill is going to make life more complicated for pregnant women and their doctors. I was interested to see one of the exceptions that they added under pressure, I mean, at the last moment, they added an exception to prevent the death of the pregnant woman or substantial physical impairment of the pregnant woman. Who will decide that?

ANN WARNER, CEO, WOMEN'S RIGHTS AND EMPOWERMENT NETWORK: Well, that's right, Alisyn. That is exactly the problem that we have with this kind of radical and extreme abortion ban. It is so unclear what would define the risk of death, and what we're hearing from doctors across the state is that it puts them in a terrible position where they have to stop and instead of giving the lifesaving medical care that they have been trained to give, that they would have to stop and consult their lawyers, and the potential risks to the life and the health of people of this state are really profound and far reaching.

BLACKWELL: The exception, as we said, is for cases of rape and incest up to 12 weeks after conception. Listen, we've talked about the 10- year-old in Ohio who was six weeks and three days along in her pregnancy and had to go to Indiana. So, the potential implications here are not far-fetched. What do you see the impact will be not just politically but on the lives of people there in South Carolina?

WARNER: There are going to be huge repercussions for the lives, the safety and the dignity of the people of our state. And I want to be really clear that the exceptions get a lot of political attention and end up being kind of a bargaining chip when it comes to debating these bills certainly here in the South Carolina State House.

[15:45:00]

They do not make this bill less harmful. Exceptions do not work. They do not protect people. And, in fact, when you require these situations to be reported to law enforcement, we're compromising the health, the safety, and the dignity of people who have already had their rights and bodily autonomy violated. So, they're really an unacceptable way to proceed when it comes to legislating here in South Carolina.

CAMEROTA: And there was also an interesting provision that they'd added in here. That the legislation says that the biological father needs to start paying child support at conception. And, you know, obviously you've heard throughout this entire debate this isn't just a woman's issue. It's a family issue. It's a man's issue. It's a human issue. What impact do you think that's going to have?

WARNER: Well, I think it's a perfect example of how far reaching the consequences of this proposed legislation might be and how little the bill sponsors seem to have considered what those impacts would be. They're unimaginable. You know, what this could mean for the lives of people in the state, for our health, for our safety, for our economic security, and, you know, we don't have to be debating this right now. South Carolina is in a special legislative session. Spending time, money, and resources debating a radical abortion ban that is only going to make our lives harder here in South Carolina. We can't afford it. We shouldn't be wasting our time on it. And we need our Senators to put a stop to it.

BLACKWELL: All right, Ann Warner, thank you so much. We will continue to pay attention what's happening there in South Carolina.

CAMEROTA: All right, well several major U.S. companies just announcing massive layoffs, adding to fears that the economy is headed for a recession. That's next.

[15:50:00]

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CAMEROTA: More companies announcing layoffs. Bed, Bath, and Beyond cutting 20 percent of its corporate employees and closing 150 stores. Snapchat's parent company is slashing 20 percent of its global staff. And last week, Ford said it would cut 3,000 jobs.

BLACKWELL: CNN business reporter Matt Egan is with us now. Any indication that this will continue?

MATT EGAN, CNN REPORTER: Well, Alisyn and Victor, I mean that's certainly been the fear, right, that we might be on the cycle of -- might be on the cusp of a big cycle of layoffs. But if you look at the latest numbers in the initial jobless claims, you know, that is just not playing out. Economists keep predicting jobless claims are going to go up. They keep going down. The latest numbers, actually a two- month low.

And a new report from Challenger, Gray and Christmas found that the number of announced job cuts fell by 21 percent between July and August. And not only that, but if you look at the total number of announced job cuts so far this year, it's the lowest point for this time of year at any time since at least 1993. None of this is to dismiss these recession concerns. I mean, there are real risks out there. The Federal Reserve is trying really hard to slow down this jobs market and you got to think that eventually they're going to succeed. But so far things look pretty healthy.

CAMEROTA: Every time you're here we like to get an update on the housing market. Where is it today?

EGAN: Well, we got new numbers on mortgage rates and they are up. You know, a year ago, you could have gotten a 30-year loan for just under 3 percent. The latest average is 5.7 percent. It's almost doubled. This is a big deal because the higher borrowing costs go, the more your monthly payments are going to be. And this is making it hard for people to afford homes right now. On top of the fact that home prices obviously have skyrocketed. All this is setting off some shockwaves in the housing market. We've seen home sale activity really fall sharply. And home prices start to cool off.

Also on the mortgage front, Bank of America just announced this new and interesting mortgage for first-time home buyers. Check this out. No down payment, no closing costs, no minimum credit score and no mortgage insurance. And this is being offered in some black and Hispanic communities in five major cities -- Charlotte, Dallas, Detroit, L.A. and Miami. Now the goal here is to try to chip away at the racial gap in home ownership.

Because remember, I mean home ownership is still the ticket to building wealth in America. And two of the biggest obstacles to buying a home for a lot of people are the down payment and the closing costs. Black home ownership rate was lower at the end of 2020 than it was a decade earlier. Hispanic home ownership rate has started to come up, but still well below that of white. And I do think though that the idea of lending to people with no min minimum credit score is going to bring back some bad memories of the subprime mortgage crisis.

Bank of America, they are stressing that they're still going to do their homework on the borrowers. They're going to make sure that they are able to have the have the resources to own a home. They're going to look at making sure that they have a history of paying rent, utilities, cell phone service. If this is successful -- and that's a biggie if -- but if it is, we could see similar programs rolled out in other cities.

BLACKWELL: Aren't those the building blocks of a credit score?

EGAN: They are, but some people don't have a credit score. I mean, if you don't have a credit card, you might not have built up a credit score, you might have a low credit score. So, they're saying they're not going to look at that. They want to make sure that you have income and that you have a history of being able to pay debt back, but they're not going to look at a credit score. They're trying to open it up to more people.

CAMEROTA: OK, Matt Egan, thank you.

EGAN: Thank you.

BLACKWELL: Thank you, Matt.

In a federal courtroom today, former President Donald Trump's lawyer dismiss the classified documents seized, comparing them to an overdue library book.

[15:55:00]

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BLACKWELL: So, this has never happened to me, but I'm glad she was able to continue on.

CAMEROTA: What happened?

BLACKWELL: So, a fly goes right into her mouth. She's doing the news and in the middle of the show, she swallows it and keeps going on. This Farah Nasser with the Global News in Toronto.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FARAH NASSER, GLOBAL NATIONAL WEEKEND ANCHOR: Eight weeks of non-stop torrential rain. A national emergency has been -- has been invoked, but the weather in Pakistan, extreme weather is alarming. Farah Nasser reports.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[16:00:04]

CAMEROTA: Give that woman an Edward R. Murrow award right now. She deserves it. She just carried on with reporting after swallowing a live fly. BLACKWELL: I feel like she needs a sip of something strong after that

too.

CAMEROTA: Well done, well done.

BLACKWELL: Well, "THE LEAD with Jake Tapper" starts right now.