Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Trump To Rally In Pennsylvania For Oz, Mastriano Amid Midterm Worries; Tupelo Pilot Lands Stolen Plane After Threatening To Crash Into A Walmart Store; U.N. Inspectors Drive Through War Zone To Visit Nuclear Plant; CDC Signs Off On Updated COVID-19 Boosters; "Furious" And Fed Up Over Street Racing In L.A. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired September 03, 2022 - 16:00   ET

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

[16:00:28]

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

Panic mode in Pennsylvania. Republicans in that key battleground state are sounding the alarm as Donald Trump's handpicked candidate -- candidates drag in the polls. Three hours from now Trump will be there in Pennsylvania to try to change that. He's stumping for Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz and the GOP's election denying candidate for governor, Doug Mastriano.

It's in a commonwealth that President Biden won by about 81,000 votes in 2020, and it's the state Biden was in Thursday night when he called out the threat posed by Trump and the Trump wing of the Republican Party.

CNN's Kristen Holmes is there for us at the rally.

Kristen, what are Pennsylvania Republicans saying? Are they concerned about these candidates right now?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, they are absolutely concerned. According to both Trump advisers as well as state Republicans that I spoke to, beside the fact that Trump has privately criticized both candidates particularly Oz, his campaign, his performance, they believe it is too late for him to actually distance himself from these races.

As you said, he handpicked Oz and despite pleas from state Republicans endorsed Mastriano in the 11th hour. So the hope now is that Trump's popularity in the state will actually boost these lagging campaigns, but I've got to tell you, Jim, it might be a heavy lift, particularly when it comes to Oz. I have spoken to a number of Republican voters, Trump supporters who say when it comes to Oz they are still on the fence.

They do not feel like they connect with him. They don't feel like they know anything about him, and this visit from Biden last week and Trump tonight really goes to show you how critical the state of Pennsylvania is this cycle, particularly that Senate seat that is now completely open, retiring Republican Pat Toomey leaving. Democrats believe this might be one of their only opportunities to pick up a seat as they cling to that majority.

Lots of questions on whether or not that can happen, whether or not Trump can actually boost his candidates here. But in addition to that political background, Jim, we've got to talk about the other background here, which is the first political event, the first public event where we are going to see former President Trump after that FBI search of his home at Mar-a-Lago. That is expected to come up later tonight.

ACOSTA: Yes, Kristen. I would almost bet money on that that it's going to come up later tonight. I don't think Trump is going to be able to resist. And of course we'll be watching all of that.

Kristen Holmes, we know you'll be there as well. Thanks so much.

Trump's visit to Pennsylvania comes just days after President Biden issued a fiery warning about MAGA Republicans and the direction of American democracy in front of Independence Hall in Philadelphia.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic. The Republican Party today has dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump. MAGA Republicans have made their choice. They live not in the light of truth but in the shadow of lies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: A day later, the president was asked if he considers all Trump supporters a threat, and here was his response.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: I don't consider any Trump supporter to be a threat to the country. I do think anyone who calls for the use of violence, fails to condemn violence when it's used, refuses to acknowledge when an election has been won, insists upon changing the way in which the rules you count votes. That is a threat to democracy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And joining me now to talk about this is former Democratic senator from Minnesota and host of the "Al Franken" podcast, Al Franken himself, and former Republican congressman from Pennsylvania, Charlie Dent.

Senator, let me start with you first. The president is trying to sound the alarm about potential violence without further dividing the country, and yet 74 million people voted for Trump in the last election. You saw that, we watched that live shot a few minutes ago from Kristen Holmes, there's a lot of people at this rally to see Donald Trump speak despite everything that's happened over the last couple of years.

How do you think President Biden handled things the other night in trying to thread the needle, in trying to reach out to all Americans?

AL FRANKEN (D), FORMER U.S. SENATOR: I think what he said was entirely proper, about 70 percent of Republican, self-identified Republican voters think that the election was rigged, and that's insane. It's just been proven over and over again that there's nothing there and that's very dangerous.

[16:05:05]

This is -- and look, the Republican National Committee called the encouragement, the riot at the Capitol legitimate political discourse. This is extremely dangerous to say that violence is legitimate political discourse. He has every -- it's important that he say this, and I do think that there are Republicans who agree with him, and there are Republicans, and I think Charlie is one of them, who understand that it's kind of insane to say this election was stolen.

But if you have all these MAGA Republicans, some of whom, a large percentage of whom, say that violence may be necessary, that's very scary and that should -- the president has not just the right but the duty to call that out.

ACOSTA: And Congressman, what about your thoughts on the president's message, and how worried are Republicans in Pennsylvania right now when it comes to this Senate race and also the race for governor featuring Doug Mastriano, who is an election denier? I mean, he is one of those Republicans Al Franken just mentioned. He is somebody who does not believe the previous election results.

CHARLIE DENT, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, let me start with President Biden's comments. I think, look, a lot of what President Biden said is accurate. The Republican Party is dominated by Donald Trump and the MAGA wing, their ruling. What I think, my problem with the president's speech was I didn't appreciate the comments about semi-fascists. I don't like when Republicans referred to Democrats, called him socialists or communists or semi-socialists or semi- communists.

I don't think that's smart. I don't think that's very good politics, and it's divisive even though his underlying point about an element within the party that is quite dangerous. And I agree with that.

Now with respect to Doug Mastriano, look, Donald Trump infuriated much of the Republican leadership in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania by endorsing Mastriano. He went against their wishes. They did not want that to happen. Also, many of them were backing Dave McCormick for the Senate seat, and he went with Mehmet Oz. So Trump has really -- he's really crossed swords with a lot of folks in the state who can make a difference, so that has been a big part of the problem.

It's even more interesting, I think this is the first time that Oz and Mastriano have appeared together. I know that Oz has not been -- I think he's been avoiding Mastriano to the greatest extent possible because Mastriano, this is a man who was ejected, thrown out of the state Senate Republican caucus in Harrisburg. I served in that caucus for six years. You know, you really have to work at it to get thrown out of there. I don't think it's ever happened before.

So this man is very extreme on multiple levels. And I think that this is -- and a lot of Republicans in the state like myself who have already endorsed Josh Shapiro, the sitting attorney general for governor, because Josh is at least a mainstream individual and a decent and honorable human being, and that's why we're backing him. But -- so I think that there's a real problem and I don't know that anything that Donald Trump denied is going to correct the issues or the problems that Mastriano has.

He doesn't have the capacity to move back to the center or try to appeal to more moderate voters. In fact, he's doubled down on where he is, so this is -- I'm not sure what the point of this is. Going into Wilkes-Barre, an area where Trump had done very well. By the way, Obama won -- I mean, yes, Obama that county and then of course Donald Trump won it in '16. So keep a close eye on this county. I'm not sure this is the best place to do this rally.

ACOSTA: And Al, I mean, a federal judge unsealed an inventory of the highly sensitive government documents that Trump had at Mar-a-Lago, and it revealed that classified documents were mixed in with clothes, gifts, magazine clippings. There are also questions about empty folders that were found, 48 of them, marked classified, 42 marked return to staff secretary/military aide.

We don't know if anything is missing, but the official line from the Trump team has been to downplay everything and compared it to overdue library books. I don't know if that's the line that Trump will use tonight. I suspect he is going to try to defend all of this in his own Trumpian way.

FRANKEN: I'm having a hard time wrapping my brain around this whole thing. It's so bad, and if you've seen Bill Barr and Karl Rove, anyone who's familiar with classified documents knows how unbelievably awful this is, and how lame everything that Trump has been saying about this and his team. This is crazy time and it's very dangerous. Very freaking dangerous. And we don't know where these documents have gone.

We don't know -- these empty folders, 40 some empty folders? I mean, you know, classified. This is extremely dangerous. Extremely dangerous.

[16:10:14]

ACOSTA: And Charlie, even Trump's own attorney general, former attorney general Bill Barr as Al Franken was just saying, he is not buying this. And let's listen to what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL BARR, FORMER ATTORNEY GENERAL: If in fact he sort of stood over scores of boxes, not really knowing what was in them and said I hereby declassified everything in here, that would be such an abuse that -- and show such recklessness that it's almost worse than taking the documents.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Yes, Charlie, is it a good idea given this investigation is progressing the way it is for members of the Republican Party to share a stage with Donald Trump before the midterms?

DENT: Of course, I never shared a stage --

ACOSTA: Would you do that?

DENT: No, I never shared a stage with him when he ran the first time either. I wouldn't get anywhere near him. But look, I think Bill Barr is right. I mean, what Donald Trump has done here, I mean, he was totally careless, reckless, and as Al said, dangerous with the way he has handled classified material. Hell, he absconded with it is what he did, you know, and Al Franken and I both know we had the privilege to sit in classified briefings, and they would hand us paper.

We would read the paper and we would give it back. Any of us who would have ever -- would have walked out with those documents and then chose not to return them, of course the G-Man is going to show up at our house and they're going take them back. You know, it's just the way it is. I mean, this is a pretty straightforward case, and you know, I urged my colleagues at the time of the search of Trump's home to be very measured, be very careful, because this is not a time to start defending a man who has done something that any member of Congress had ever done.

I'm sure they'd be prosecuted for it, and Trump is dangerous, and as Barr said, the fact that -- how could he declassify this stuff? There's a process to do this. He didn't do any of it, and we all know it, and so bottom line is that I think Trump has got a lot of problems here and Republicans should stay a million miles away from him right now. That's my opinion.

ACOSTA: Yes, Al, I've had some overdue --

(CROSSTALK)

ACOSTA: Yes, I was going to say I've had some overdue library books over the years. It never got that tense.

FRANKEN: You know, remember when he said I could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and I wouldn't lose a vote? Maybe that was true, but he'd be prosecuted for killing someone.

(LAUGHTER)

FRANKEN: This is illegal. This is really illegal. This is dangerous and illegal, so, yes, maybe he could have shot someone and not lost any Trump voters. But he would have been prosecuted for murder. This is illegal.

DEAN: He broke the law people.

ACOSTA: Yes, and Al --

DENT: It's so straightforward.

ACOSTA: I have to ask you, Al, as a Democrat who would like to see Democrats expand their majority in the Senate and maybe pick up some governor seats along the way, is this exactly what you would like to see out on the campaign trail later on this evening with Trump and Mastriano and Dr. Oz, or does it worry you a little bit that --

FRANKEN: No.

ACOSTA: That they could potentially get elected? OK.

FRANKEN: I want Trump to make this about him. This is going to be a referendum on Biden and on inflation, and all this stuff, inflation is going down. Gas prices are going down. There's been a number of huge accomplishments by Biden and the Congress, so things are looking better there, but man, oh, man, yes, this could -- this should be a referendum on Trump, this election. I really do. I think that's a really good idea.

ACOSTA: And Charlie, what do you think? Is that --

FRANKEN: I love that Trump is doing this.

ACOSTA: Would you agree, Charlie, this election is now about Trump, this midterm cycle?

DENT: Well, it's becoming much more about Trump. Certainly Republicans wanted this election to be a referendum on Joe Biden and the Democrats, but now with the Dobbs decision and of course the raid on Trump's home, the continuing election denial and some very MAGA candidates, you know, winning primaries in various states like Arizona and in Pennsylvania for the governor's race, yes, I mean, this is becoming more about Donald Trump.

The fact that he's showing up in Pennsylvania, I can't imagine that Mehmet Oz wants Donald Trump in Pennsylvania standing next to him at this general election. I think they all kind of get the joke, OK, they needed Trump to win a primary, but they also realized he's probably the kiss of death in the general election with a lot of swing voters, which you will need in Pennsylvania. Republicans don't have a plurality, let alone a majority of voters in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Democrats have the plurality, so they need to pick up -- Republican candidate statewide certainly need to pick up independents and a significant number of Democrats, and that's why we've elected people with names like John Hines and Tom Ridge and Arlen Specter and the Scrantons and the Zwickers who are very mainstream. We have not had a very good track record with extreme candidates.

[16:15:06]

ACOSTA: You're getting real Pennsylvania on us now, Charlie.

DENT: I'm just saying. These are people who have won statewide, have had wonderful Dick Thornburg. ACOSTA: Yes. Right.

DENT: These were people as attorney general. These are really button down people, serious people. They weren't these -- they were not bomb throwers.

ACOSTA: And Al, as an "SNL" super fan, I always pester you with these "SNL" questions at the end of these segments. But I have to ask you, I want to hear reaction to what former cast member Rob Schneider said about the show this week. Let's listen to what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROB SCHNEIDER, ACTOR: When Hillary Clinton lost, which is understandable that she would lose.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. Right.

SCHNEIDER: Not exactly the most logical person in the room, and then when Kate McKinnon went out there on "Saturday Night Live" on the cold opening, you know, like, she started to dress as Hillary Clinton and she starts playing "Hallelujah."

(MUSIC)

SCHNEIDER: And I said, I literally prayed, please have a joke at the end.

KATE MCKINNON, COMEDIAN: I'm not giving up and neither should you, and live from New York, it's "Saturday Night."

SCHNEIDER: And there was no joke at the end, and I went it's over.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Yes, Al, what did you make of those comments? I mean, is that a former cast member taking the show too seriously? What was your take on that?

FRANKEN: Well, it's -- people have been saying the show was over. I was one of the original writers, and I remember after the first show, second season, I think Lily Tomlin was the host, and I think it was a really good show. I go up to the 17th floor where we write the show and all that stuff, and I, like an idiot, their phone is ringing and I answer it. And someone says, well, the show's over. "Saturday Night" dead. And we've been hearing that for 47 years or something like that. So, no, it's a silly thing for Rob to say I think.

ACOSTA: All right. Well, thanks to both of you. We appreciate it. Great talking to you, Al Franken, once again, Charlie Dent. Thanks so much. Appreciate your time.

Coming up, a frightening moment in the sky. Somebody steals a plane and says he'll crash it into a crowded store. How it all came to an end. Plus, NASA will have to wait just a bit longer before blasting off

toward the moon. What delayed the Artemis I mission for the second time.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:21:37]

ACOSTA: This just in, welcome news for Jackson, Mississippi, city officials reporting water pressure has been returned to most residents there and that significant progress was made overnight. They caution a few remaining pockets in south Jackson may still be experiencing low or no water pressure as repairs continue on a water treatment plant that was overcome by flooding.

Also in Mississippi, a disaster was narrowly averted earlier today after a man stole an airplane, then called 911 from the cockpit saying he was going to crash it into a Walmart. Negotiators eventually made contact and talked him out of that plan. But the incident was far from over. The suspect took -- look at this -- an unpredictable flight path for several hours. You can see it in this flight tracker, and then he landed in a field with no injuries.

I'm joined now by CNN's Nadia Romero and CNN aerospace analyst, Miles O'Brien.

Nadia, let me start with you. You're following this there on the ground. What do we know about the suspect and how this situation played out? I mean, just thank goodness this didn't end up being some big disaster or tragedy. It could have gone way worse.

NADIA ROMERO, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Jim, that's exactly right. I mean, we could be outside of that Walmart in Tupelo that he threatened to crash that plane in if he had gone through with that threat and hadn't alerted authorities, right? This could have been a terrible situation. It started early this morning when police say he went to Tupelo Aviation. We know he works there so he had access to the facility and to the planes.

He stole one of those aircrafts, went up in the air, was circling Tupelo, Mississippi. Told authorities he was going to crash into a Walmart. They evacuated that Walmart. Put up roadblocks around it. Just hoping that he wouldn't go through with those threats. Police tell us that negotiators were able to get on the line with him and convince him not to crash into that store or anywhere else.

Now they were trying to convince him to land in Tupelo. He went past that flight plan and decided to land somewhere else in a soybean field not far from Tupelo. Witnesses there tell us that they heard the thud. When they went outside, they saw him with his hands up surrendering himself to police without injuring anyone else.

I want you to hear from the mayor of Tupelo saying that this was the best-case scenario for this situation.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MAYOR TODD JORDAN, TUPELO, MISSISSIPPI: So we, like I said, I think this is probably the best-case scenario, you know, when I get a phone call at 6:00 in the morning from the police and fire chief, that's never a good thing, and of the thousand scenarios that I could have thought of, this was not one of them that would happen here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMERO: So we also know that Cory Patterson mid-flight posted on his Facebook account apologizing, saying that he never meant to hurt anyone, he didn't want to hurt his parents or his sisters. We also learned from the mayor that his family was worried about him as well. They were in contact with his family members.

Jim, there's still so many questions out there, but we do know that he is in custody right now facing a long list of charges, including grand larceny and making terroristic threats.

ACOSTA: All right. And Miles, I mean, I'm just -- I mean, dumbfounded by this flight tracker graphic we had up earlier where you see the lines just going every which way. It looks like a little kid with an Etch-a-Sketch. I mean I think this just underlines how precarious the situation was and how these agencies had a coordinated response very quickly -- Miles.

[16:25:02]

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AEROSPACE ANALYST: Yes, it's a scenario that a lot of things had to line up to make this happen in the first place, and then also not lead to the outcome that could have been so bad. The fact that he was an airport insider, got him inside the fence. He's a trusted person and was not able to -- was able, I should say, to pass through all the gates and with the IDs that would be necessary to get inside the fence at an airport, and clearly had enough aviation knowledge to get in that aircraft and started up those two engines.

It's not a simple thing. It's not just like turning the key over in a car. There's a procedure you have to do. It's not that it's a secret, but it is a process, so all of that lined up for this to occur, and then fortunately they were able to talk him down.

I am curious, though, when you think about it, he was in the air for quite some time. I haven't heard yet, Jim, and I'd like to know, to what extent were Air National Guard authorities notified and was there an attempt to intercept? This does take us back frankly, even when you're thinking about the possibility of an aircraft being used as a terrorist weapon. Takes us back to 9/11. Here we are approaching the anniversary. And was there a scramble? Was there an attempt to intercept, and then if they had intercepted it, what would they have tried to do, talk him down or if the worst case was going to happen, would they have done something more drastic?

These are questions I'd like to learn about as the NTSB looks into this.

ACOSTA: And Miles, do we have to look at the security of general aviation facilities, you know, where people can get access and jump on a cockpit like this and cause this kind of a scare?

O'BRIEN: Yes, it's something that I'm sure the NTSB will be looking at. But as I say, when you have somebody who's an employee, a trusted individual who's allowed inside the perimeter, it's pretty hard to do much about that. If it had been somebody who got through the system or leapt the fence and was an outsider, that would have been a different story.

It is true, we have -- you know, we have 5,000 airports in the United States, and the amount that they are guarded, it varies widely depending on how frequently they are used, but aviation in general is -- there's a lot of people looking out for each other and, frankly, looking out to make sure nothing bad is happening. The old see something, say something motto does exist in the world of general aviation.

But you know, maybe there's some lessons learned here that should be brought forward. You know, one of the things that goes through aviation a lot these days is the concern of the mental health pilot crews and what that can lead to in the air. We've seen some horrible instances of that, and maybe this is something that would call for a closer look at the people who can get near airplanes, start them up, get inside the perimeter. Maybe that's something that needs to be watched more closely as well.

ACOSTA: Yes, and Nadia, where does the investigation go from here, do you think?

ROMERO: Yes, so we know that there are questions about, as Miles was saying, about Tupelo Aviation. We know that there was a tower there and there was security between I believe it was 6:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m., and we think that Cory Patterson was there before those hours early in the morning. And so there were questions about how he was able to get in. We know he was obviously an employee, but what level of access did he have, what level of training did he have.

Those are still questions, and then there's the larger questions about his mindset because he originally said he wanted to crash that plane into a Walmart, and you would think that that would be somebody with suicidal thoughts. But then at the same time, he posted on social media that he never wanted to hurt anyone, so there were a lot of questions about his mindset, and this really reminds me of an incident back in 2018 where a Horizon Air employee stole a plane from Sea-Tac Airport and we never got those answers because he died in a plane crash. Now we might get those answers from Cory Patterson.

ACOSTA: All right, Nadia Romero, Miles O'Brien -- great to see you, Miles. Great to see you, Nadia, as well. Thanks so much for your time. We appreciate it.

A mission to the moon 50 years in the making will have to wait just a little bit longer. NASA's historic Artemis I launch was scrubbed today, called off for the second time this week due to a liquid hydrogen leak. And now top NASA leadership is saying they may have to roll the moon rocket all the way back to the vehicle assembly building for repairs, a move that could push back a future launch attempt for weeks.

We are waiting on an update from NASA any moment, and we'll bring that to you just as soon as it comes in.

Coming up, the new details about the dangers at a nuclear plant in Ukraine that's been under constant shelling. A live report on what inspectors found next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:34:10]

ACOSTA: Pakistan is requesting more help after flash floods buried a third of the country under water. The high waters have killed more than 1,200 people and upended the lives of another 33 million now struggling to survive. The fast-moving monsoon has washed away roads, homes and crops.

The U.S. is among those deploying disaster assistance to Pakistan. The growing concern now is disease and hunger. U.N. secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, will tour Pakistan's flooded areas on friday.

Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant has been knocked offline again, but a backup reserve line is still providing electricity.

Europe's largest nuclear plant is right in the middle of the war zone and has been under shelling for weeks now. A U.N. nuclear watchdog group is on a risky mission to inspect the plant and say they're concerned about the power supply and the safety of the staff there.

[16:35:01]

A full report of their findings is expected soon, but many are not waiting.

CNN's Sam Kiley spoke to refugees fleeing areas near Zaporizhzhia.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: There are currently six members of the International Atomic Energy Agency's U.N. inspectors in the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.

That number is expected to go down as they produce their first and preliminary report following their initial visit. But how long those two people will be able to stay there remains to be seen, according to the man who led the mission, Rafael Grossi, the head of IAEA.

And this is how it unfolded.

(voice-over): Newly arrived refugees from Russian-held territory, their I.D.s are carefully checked. But it's contamination from the Russian side that's most feared. Radioactive contamination.

They've come from around Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, which has been on the frontline of Russia's war with Ukraine. These retirees say they fled in a car with mortars flying over their

heads just as U.N. inspectors arrived after weeks of negotiation.

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: Mortars flying right above us, above the car. You didn't know where to go and right behind us there was bang, bang. They let us through because IAEA was on its way, and they let us through so there were no queues.

KILEY: Russia's defense minister insisted there are no heavy weapons near the plant.

SERGEI SHOIGU, RUSSIAN DEFENSE MINISTER (through translation): We don't have heavy weapons on the territory of the nuclear power plant and in the surrounding areas. I hope that the IAEA commission be will able to see that.

KILEY: On day one, the U.N. inspectors encountered Russian troops and Russian trucks inside nuclear facilities. Ukrainian officials say they're a fire hazard and may even carry explosives. Armed personnel carriers armed with cannons marked with a Russian invader "Z" also visible.

During the visit, Russian officials are keen to reinforce their claims of Ukrainian attacks on the plant, pointing out spent rockets.

(on camera): So you're leaving Zaporizhzhia?

(voice-over): A local woman shows the chief nuclear inspector a dossier on alleged Ukrainian attacks.

Refugees who arrived in Zaporizhzhia from the town next to the plant tell of Russian helicoptered gun ships and worse.

(on camera): These are the latest refugees to have arrived from a dormitory town for the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Station. We've spoken to a large number of them. None of them want to risk being identified because many of them still have families in the town.

But they all tell us, to a man and a woman, that they've seen the evidence of Russians shelling their own positions.

They say that they hear the flash to bang, the outgoing mortar, and then the incoming bomb landing within one or two seconds of each other.

RAFAEL GROSSI, DIRECTOR-GENERAL, IAEA: And I was able to see myself and my team impact holes, markings on buildings of shellings.

His pledge to keep inspections going is falling short of Ukraine's demands that Russian troops leave the power plant.

VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translation): Unfortunately, we haven't heard the main thing from the IAEA, which is the call for Russia to demilitarize the station. What can we do without it.

(EXPLOSIONS)

KILEY: Ukraine's launched a counteroffensive against Russia this week. So in the long-term, Ukraine may not be able to keep its promise not to fire on targets close to Europe's biggest nuclear plant.

(on camera): Now given the increasing scale and violence of the Ukrainian offensive, it does remain very difficult to see how the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Station could stay out of the fighting.

And just in the last 24 hours, a very unusual admission coming from the Ukrainian authorities that they have, indeed, used precision weapons, they say, in the dormitory town next to that very sensitive nuclear power station.

Sam Kiley, CNN, in Odessa.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: Coming up, the CDC signs off on updated COVID-19 boosters. Everything you need to know, next.

[16:39:12]

You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ACOSTA: A landmark moment in the nation's fight against COVID. That's the reaction from U.S. surgeon general, Vivek Murthy, after the FDA and CDC gave the go ahead to roll out updated boosters. They target not only the Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants but also the original strain of the coronavirus.

CNN's chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, has more on when you will see those shots in your local pharmacy.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: What we can tell you is that as soon as the FDA gave that emergency use authorization for these new shots, they began shipping to many pharmacies and health care providers around the country.

So this weekend, over the next several days, certainly these shots should be increasingly available for people. Just like they have been in the past. They should be free. You should be able to make appointments, get them from your doctors, clinics, pharmacies, et cetera.

A big question that also comes up is, how long should you wait in between shots? When should you get this shot? That kind of depends a little bit on when you've received your last shot.

So just broadly speaking, if you sort of look at the benefits of getting these shots versus not getting any shots at all, you've seen this data before, but for people over the age of 50, people who are unvaccinated compared to those who have had two or more shots have 14 times the risk of dying.

And people who are vaccinated with one booster had three times the risk of dying as compared to those who had two boosters. So that gives you some idea of the importance, first of all, of these shots.

Now how long to these shots last is sort of the second part of the question that helps you answer then when you should get a shot.

[16:45:00]

And what we can tell you, you look at these graphs -- and they kind of busy graphs -- but what we know is that the effectiveness of these vaccines do wane over time.

So at four or five months, they're about 33 percent as effective as they were when you first got the shot. So that could give you some insights as well as to when you might best actually benefit or get the shot.

Part of the reason that they're acting now on this -- and again, the vote was 13-1, so it was pretty clear that they wanted to go ahead and release these booster shots now.

Was because, if they waited until November, what they found was that the forecast, the modeling suggested there could be 130,000 or so more hospitalizations if they waited that long and 10,000 more deaths.

So this is a bivalent vaccine, meaning part of it protects against the original strain, COVID strain that we started talking about in the spring of 2020, but it also protects against the new variants such as BA.5 and BA.4.

So again, over the next several days, these shots should be increasingly available.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: All right, thanks, Sanjay, for that.

Coming up, street racing in the neighborhood where the "Fast and Furious" movie franchise was filmed sparks protests in Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANNA MARIE PIERSIMONI, LOST HUSBAND TO STREET RACING: I feel furious. Yes, there's another meaning to that word than in the movie "Fast and Furious."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:50:51]

ACOSTA: Illegal street racing is a nationwide problem, but it's particularly bad in an L.A. neighborhood made famous by the "The Fast and the Furious" movie franchise.

As CNN's Stephanie Elam found out, people who live there are furious.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From around the globe --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: In the "Fast and Furious" world, Bob's Market is an icon.

ELAM: -- "Fast and Furious" fans come to this Los Angeles neighborhood to take pictures in front of this shop made famous by the movie franchise.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We were here in L.A., so I want to see the market and also the house from "Fast and Furious."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's nice. I mean this is really great.

ELAM: But the movies, known for their fast cars and daring stunts, have left their mark on this neighborhood in another way. The scars of street racing and doughnuts mark the intersection where so-called takeovers, similar to these, have invaded the neighborhood.

BELLA, ANGELENO HEIGHTS RESIDENT: They're coming around drifting, doing doughnuts, spinning around like crazy with their mufflers sounding like explosions.

ELAM: For the people who live here --

BELLA: The smoke that it leaves behind from the tires burning, it lingers. It doesn't go away.

ELAM: -- it's more than a nuisance.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You hear these, like, screeches, and it happens until the cops come.

ELAM: It's dangerous and illegal. Takeovers like these happening at all hours of the day.

BELLA: You're putting our lives at risk. You're putting our neighborhood at risk. They don't stop at the stop signs anymore.

ELAM: Across the country, drivers are taking over streets, racing, doing doughnuts and burnouts.

Just in the last week, an entire block was damaged by out-of-control cars in Des Moines. Police in Salt Lake City arrested six people for illegally racing.

Another blocked police from getting to a shooting in Portland, Oregon. Chandler, Arizona, police say an illegal drag race left one driver dead.

Near Chicago, a pedestrian was struck and killed. A city alderman saying higher fines and impounding vehicles has little effect.

BYRON SIGCHO-LOPEZ, CHICAGO ALDERMAN: We see it, these incidents, not stopping. They haven't stopped. If anything, they've gotten worse and worse.

ELAM: Rumble strips in Compton, California, did little to slow down the takeovers.

(CROSSTALK)

ELAM: Fed up residents in L.A. taking to the streets in protest.

PIERSIMONI: That's Larry and that's Larry.

ELAM: Anna Marie Piersimoni is one of them. She lost Larry Brooks, her husband of more than 30 years, when he went out for some exercise and never came home.

PIERSIMONI: The driver revved his car to 90, spun out, lost control. He hit my husband and six other cars. My husband had 10 minutes to live after that. It's called vehicular manslaughter. But it was murder.

ELAM: She and others are calling for a disclaimer to be added to the "Fast and Furious" films, convinced they glamorize street racing.

Universal Pictures did not return our request for comment.

PIERSIMONI: I feel furious. Yes, there's another meaning to that word than the movie "Fast and Furious."

LILI TRUJILLO PUCKETT, FOUNDER, STREET RACING KILLS: You can go to jail. You can kill someone. You can injure yourself.

ELAM: Lili Trujillo Puckett started the non-profit Street Racing Kills after her 16-year-old daughter, Valentina, was killed in 2013. Now Puckett mentors street racers who have been punished by the courts.

PUCKETT: Having your whole dreams and your life is gone away for 40 years. And you're going to have the other party telling you this is what you took away from us.

ELAM: Her message not heard nearly enough, she says, lost in a haze of burning rubber, and roaring engines.

Stephanie Elam, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: They risk their lives to bring us the biggest headlines from around the world. "NO ORDINARY LIFE," a new CNN film, shares the remarkable story of five female photojournalists who made their marks by braving the frontlines to capture images from Tiananmen Square, conflicts in Iraq, Somalia and more. Here's a preview.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) (CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You guys, wait.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The driver starts to take off and all I was thinking was I had a driver kiss off during an ambush.

(SHOUTING)

(GUNFIRE)

(SHOUTING)

(SHOUTING)

[16:55:05]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's gunfire all around us.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was afraid. It's like (EXPLETIVE DELETED) you know?

I'm not an adrenaline junky. It's not all about the frontlines and bang, bang with me. In war zones, what I care about the most are the civilians, the human beings, who, through no choice of their own, are forced to live in these places.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: "NO ORDINARY LIFE" premiers Monday night at 10:00 only on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)