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Steve Bannon Being Sentenced For Criminal Contempt Of Congress; Biden To Discuss Student Debt Relief As Critical Midterms Near; Children's Hospitals Overwhelmed With Surge In Respiratory Illness. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired October 21, 2022 - 9:00   ET

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

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BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everyone. I'm Bianna Golodryga. Happening right now, former top Trump adviser Steve Bannon is in a Washington DC courtroom. Here he is arriving just moments ago. He's about to be sentenced after being convicted on two counts of contempt of Congress.

All of this stemming from his refusal to testify before the January 6 Select Committee and his failure to turn over documents. So let's begin this morning outside the US District Court in Washington, DC. CNN political correspondent Sarah Murray is there. Sarah, how is all this expected to play out today?

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, look, Steve Bannon is here in court. We expect this could take you know, a couple of hours. And what we know is that Steve Bannon is trying to get out of any kind of jail time. He was convicted on two counts for refusing to show up for a subpoena, to testify before Congress and refusing to hand over documents.

The government has asked that he spend six months behind bars, and they said he should pay a $200,000 fine. Now Bannon's team has said look at the most he should get probation. He listened to his attorney's advice. And if you are going to put him behind bars, it should be house arrest only. They're also saying ban and plans to appeal his conviction. And they're saying that any punishment he receives should essentially be put on hold while that appeal plays out.

The government has taken issue with that as well saying no, look, he did nothing to try to accommodate the process. He did nothing to try to accommodate the January 6 committee. Whatever sentence is handed down today, he should have to serve it immediately. So of course, things are just going to get underway in a few minutes here in the courtroom and we're going to wait and see what the judge makes of all of this.

GOLODRYGA: And you'll let us know when the judge decides. Sara Murray, thank you.

MURRAY: Absolutely.

GOLODRYGA: And first on CNN, sources say former Trump White House Counsel Pat Cipollone, and former senator Kelly Loeffler both testified before Georgia Grand Jury investigating 2020 election interference. This as a federal appeals court has given Atlanta investigators the green light to subpoena South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham. CNN Senior Justice correspondent Evan Perez is following all of this.

So Evan, what can you tell us about the appearances by Loeffler and Cipollone?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well Bianna, we know that the Fulton County grand jury has been bringing in witnesses. They're obviously focusing on the efforts of the former president and some of his allies to overturn the Georgia election results in 2020.

And Kelly Loeffler, the former senator from Georgia was a very active ally. Some emails some text messages rather, that have been obtained by the Atlanta Journal Constitution, portray her being in contact with people like Marjorie Taylor Greene, Congresswoman who was a top ally of the former president, trying to figure out ways to overturn and challenge the Georgia election results. In the case of Pat Cipollone, he was a top lawyer at the White House, White House Counsel, in fact, and he pushed back at the former president and some of his allies, as they were trying to figure out ways to claim that there was enough fraud to keep the former president in office, claiming that he had won Georgia and in other States.

And so these are witnesses that are very important to the Georgia, the Fulton County investigation. You see there a list of other people who have gone in, including Boris Epstein, who is still a top ally and a former adviser of the former president, Rudy Giuliani has also appeared. And of course, Senator Lindsey Graham is now according to the appeals court, they're in Atlanta, he has to show up to provide testimony.

He, the former - the Senator Graham has claimed that he is exempt from this because of the speech or Debate Clause. The appeals court has said that he should testify to the grand jury, at least with regard to his efforts, his conversations with the former president and allies to try to overturn those election results in Georgia.

We don't know whether he's going to appeal and try to keep - stop this testimony from going forward, Bianna. But, but right now, that's what the courts are ordering him to do.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, he's been trying to delay this testimony for months now. Evan Perez, thank you.

PEREZ: Thanks.

GOLODRYGA: Joining me now is Renato Mariotti, a former federal prosecutor and host of the On Topic podcast. Renato, never a dull Friday morning. Thank you so much for joining us. So what do you make of these two prominent witnesses, the former senator Kelly Loeffler and White House Counsel Pat Cipollone, both appearing before this grand jury.

RENATO MARIOTTI, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Well, Senator Loeffler is going to be a very interesting witness. We did look at the text messages. What they really show a picture is of her being a reluctant participant in the run up to January 6. She had reluctantly said that she would challenge the certification, changed her mind in doing so.

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And you really can see in sort of the back and forth with some of the others, including the wife of Secretary Raffensperger. I think, a real struggle internally for her as she was being torn between what her political fortunes would have her do in which he understood the right thing to do. So I actually think, you know, now that she's out of office, she may give some very frank testimony.

As to Mr. Cipollone, you know, he was somebody who's giving, you know, very reasonable, accurate legal advice from all - for all - by all accounts, in the midst of January 6 in all of the runoff by the attempts by the former president to overturn the results of the election.

So his testimony can be very crucial, although, of course, there are potential privilege issues and so on that might limit the extent of his testimony.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, what we'll talk about more of these executive privileges that that he could sort of use in his defense, because as you mentioned, he's been seen throughout these numerous investigations. He appeared before a grand jury investigating the January 6 attack in Washington. He, as we saw up here before the January 6 committee as well as through their hearings, and we also know that he was interviewed by the FBI for his - the President's - the former president's Mar-a-Lago documents scandal. So what kind of executive privileges could he exert at this point?

MARIOTTI: So executive privilege would actually be, you know, fairly heightened for someone like him, the White House Counsel giving advice to the President, but existing case law by the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, which is the Federal Court of Appeals over the DC Circuit - over the District of Columbia makes clear that a grand jury proceeding Trumps any potential executive privilege or even attorney-client privilege, because Mr. Cipollone was a government lawyer representing the office of the presidency.

He wasn't representing Trump personally. And so I do believe that the FBI has all of the information and was - received answers to their questions. The questions that when we were watching the January 6 committee, we couldn't hear him answer because he would assert privilege. I don't know whether or not Mr. Cipollone took a similar position or was willing to be as forthcoming with investigators in Georgia but I do believe that if that was litigated through the courts, that would ultimately be the - be the result.

GOLODRYGA: As we're awaiting the sentencing for Steve Bannon, walk us through what the judge is currently going through, right, as he's trying to figure out and come up with what his sentence should look like, we know prosecutors had suggested six months.

MARIOTTI: Yes, Bianna, that's a really great question. What the judge is looking at is something called a pre-sentence investigation report, which is a report that is prepared by an arm of the U.S. courts, that contains all sorts of things about Mr. Bannon's history. His, you know, results of his interview, background check, any potential criminal actions, you know, of course, he had been indicted and then pardoned by the former president.

And the judge is going to look at all of the history and characteristics of Mr. Bannon, which includes not only his criminal history, but his upbringing. And then, of course, you know, many of his statements and actions that weren't even necessarily criminal, but are, you know, whether it's negative or positive, and then is going to also look at all the circumstances of this event and determine what the appropriate sentence will be.

Under this statute, 30 days in prison is the minimum sentence. So Mr. Bannon will be going prison. The question is just how long. The government wants six months, he's saying zero, it's going to be 30 days, I imagine that he's trying to angle for, you know, house arrest or something where, you know, he won't actually spend time in prison, but would be in home confinement.

GOLODRYGA: We're expecting that decision any moment. Renato Mariotti, thank you.

MARIOTTI: Yes.

GOLODRYGA: And later today, President Biden will address two central - two issues central to Democrats ahead of these critical midterms deficit reduction and student debt relief. CNN White House correspondent, Jeremy Diamond joins me now from the North Lawn. So Jeremy, who is the target of the President's message as we count down to election day?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen what President Biden is doing in this final stretch towards election day, he's not holding a lot of campaign rallies but he is trying to fulfill his role as his party's chief messenger in this stretch towards the midterm campaigns.

And that's why over the course of this last week, we've seen him talk about the policy successes of his administration and also talking about those issues central to voters' decisions, whether it was a speech on abortion earlier this week, yesterday talking about infrastructure, talking about gas prices earlier in the week, and today we're going to see him talking about two issues, deficit reduction and the student loan debt relief program.

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And that program in particular, we know that young voters already, if you look at the polling, they already largely support Democrats over Republicans, 44 percent to 37 percent for Republicans. But what the White House has seen is that there's been a bump already in the numbers that they've seen, the internal polls that they've seen from the student debt relief program that they weren't necessarily expecting.

And so that's why while we haven't heard the President speak about this debt relief program too much since he initially announced it, today, he's going big on that topic. He's going to be announcing an update on this. And he's also going to be going after Republican members of Congress calling out what he sees as a hypocrisy for Republicans who criticize this plan.

But at the same time lawmakers who've also accepted hundreds of 1000s of dollars in pandemic relief loans that were forgiven by the federal government. That according to a White House official, but in terms of his strategy and why the President is holding more official events to talk about policy than rallies, here's the White House Chief of Staff, Ron Klain.

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RON KLAIN, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: Both President Obama, I was here, I'll share responsibility for it, and President Trump got walloped in the midterms. So I don't think it should surprise anyone that we're not using the strategy that failed in 2010 and the strategy that failed in 2018. I don't think rallies have proved effective for candidates in the midterms. And so we're trying something different that we think will be effective.

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DIAMOND: And so while you won't see the president holding many rallies, according to the White House Chief of Staff, what you will see as him continue to fundraise. He's held multiple fundraisers a week, and he will be getting out there. He said yesterday that he'll be going - he's gotten requests to go to 16 to 18 states over the coming weeks. Already next Friday, we know he'll be back in Pennsylvania, to hold a fundraiser for the state party in Pennsylvania.

GOLODRYGA: And he had two favorable court decisions yesterday on student debt relief as well. Jeremy Diamond, thank you.

Well, right now hospitals are seeing an unprecedented surge in a respiratory illness among children. It's really frightening. RSV is a common cold virus that can be associated with severe disease in young children and older adults. And the CDC says it's already hitting peak levels in some areas.

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DR. JUAN SALAZAR, PHYSICIAN IN CHIEF, CONNECTICUT CHILDREN'S MEDICAL CENTER: This has really stepped up over the last two, three weeks. And it's created some difficulties for us because again, our beds are filled to capacity. The kids keep coming in. And so we've had a situation where we have to expand our services in a way that we can provide all the care for the kids that are coming in with RSV.

I've been doing this for a long time. I've been at Connecticut Children's for 25 years, and I have never seen this level of surge specifically of RSV coming into our hospital.

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GOLODRYGA: CNN Medical Correspondent Dr. Tara Narula is here with the details. And Tara, CNN analysis of new HHS data shows children are filling hospital beds more now than over the past two years in the pandemic. I'm hearing anecdotally from friends too whose children are suffering with this, one had to be hospitalized. Why are we seeing a spike in cases?

DR. TARA NARULA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, Bianna, we've done COVID mitigation strategies really well over the last couple of years. And so kids normally get exposed to RSV, and almost all of us have it at some point in our lives before we reach the age of two. But because of what we've done in the past two years, we've changed the equilibrium, right?

So kids have not gotten exposed, they've not developed the immunity. And now we're seeing this big influx all at once of children, even potentially children who are older than they would have had this type of reaction previously. And so yes, as you mentioned, we're seeing a spike across the country in RSV, particularly pediatric hospital beds filling up.

We know that three quarters of pediatric hospital beds are filled now compared to an average day to in the past two years when it was about two thirds. In general, this is a very common lower respiratory tract infection for kids under the age of one. And on average, we see about 58,000 hospitalizations a year for kids under five, 2 million outpatient visits for kids under five and kids usually do well, whether at home or even when they go to the hospital, they get symptomatic treatment and they usually recover.

So we don't want to scare parents. There usually are about 100 to 300 deaths per year. But it is important to understand if you see symptoms in your kid and know exactly when to act and when you can relax a little bit.

GOLODRYGA: I guess the frightening part is just having to hospitalized your child at all. What are the symptoms parents should be looking for.

NARULA: So it can be hard to tell the difference between this and a cold or COVID or the flu. So runny nose, sneezing, coughing, fever, sometimes wheezing. If you have a young baby, you may see increased irritability, decreased activity or difficulty breathing.

So some of the signs you want to look for breathing difficulty would be flaring of the nostrils, kind of belly breathing where you see the ribs or if your child's unable to keep down fluids and they're getting dehydrated. That's really the point where you'd want to take them to an emergency room. There are tests that your pediatrician can do to kind of differentiate between flu versus RSV so that is an option as well.

And if you're treating your kid at home, usually over the counter pain relievers, fever, reducers and hydration. This is what we normally do and typically kids recover within a week.

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GOLODRYGA: Well, just good advice for parents to stay alert and vigilant.

NARULA: Yes.

GOLODRYGA: Tara Narula, thank you.

NARULA: Thank you.

GOLODRYGA: Well, up next we are live in Kyiv as Ukrainians deal with power blackouts from a barrage of Russian attacks on power facilities. I'll speak with a member of the Ukrainian parliament about what they need from the U.S. and other allies.

Plus new CNN reporting about what's happening behind the scenes as the Biden Administration struggles to find a cohesive border policy. One source describing the process as Hail Mary after Hail Mary.

And later the race is on for the leader, the next leader of the UK. Could Boris Johnson really return as Britain's Prime Minister?

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GOLODRYGA: The White House now says Iran is not only supplying kamikaze drones to Russia, but it has sent its own personnel to Crimea to help train Russian troops and how to use them.

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Russia has increasingly used the Kamikaze drones that explode on impact to pummel Ukrainian cities and infrastructure. As a consequence the EU and UK have both announced new sanctions on Iran. CNN's Barbara Starr joins us from the Pentagon. So Barbara, what more are we learning about the Iranian support there in Crimea and why it's impacting the U.S.'s speed here in response?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, what we know now from both the White House and the Pentagon is they've come to the assessment, the conclusion, if you will, not just that Iran is supplying drones to Russia, to attack inside Ukraine, but that some number of Iranian forces have gone to the Crimea area, where these drones are flying from to facilitate the operation there.

Whether they're training the resident, or just facilitating the operation, there are have been Iranian troops inside Crimea. This is where the drones are being launched from and as you say, these are drones that fly to a target, guided and explode on impact. These are the drones that the Russian forces are using to some considerable effect in attacking civilian targets, power plants, apartment buildings, killing civilians.

Now the Ukrainians have been able to bring down, shoot down any number of them. So it's not like all the drones are getting through to their target. And they're essentially seen as weapons of terror to terrorize the population. You know, but make no mistake, there's a couple of things on the calendar that everybody's watching. And front and center is the winter weather is coming.

So both Ukrainians and the Russians are going to want to solidify their battle positions and get into place if they need to wait out the winter. And for Ukraine, that means they are still pressing very hard, very understandably, in their view, for an acceleration of that air defense capability.

The U.S. speeding up the delivery of some of the air defense, it's promised also, both UK and Germany contributing to the air defense equipment being shipped to Ukraine, but Ukraine clearly fails in this situation. It needs more and it needs it fast. Bianna.

GOLODRYGA: Yes concerns not only about the drones, but potential missile, ballistic missiles and surface to surface missiles that Iran may be supplying to Russia as well. Barbara Starr, thank you.

Well, Ukrainian forces fighting to wrench back territory from Russia in the East have reportedly hit the Luhansk region with American made rocket systems called HIMARS killing six in 24 hours. That's according to pro-Russian officials in the region. But Russian attacks on the power grid in Ukraine have made daily life even harder for civilians.

The country has lost at least 40 percent of its electricity generation forcing scheduled blackouts nationwide. Joining me now from Kyiv is Kira Rudik. She is a member of the Ukrainian parliament and the leader of the Voice Party, Kira, it's good to see you. Thank you for joining us. You know, I talked to you during the commercial break, and you said your fingers were crossed there, because you're working on a backup generator. What is the situation there like it in terms of electricity and power in the city?

KIRA RUDIK, MEMBER OF UKRAINIAN PARLIAMENT: Hello, Bianna. Thank you so much for having me. Well, indeed, we are on an energy saving mode. The whole country is actually at it. We know that in the evening, we are asked only to turn lights on in one room at your apartment. And this is what we are doing because there are so many facilities that critically need electricity, such as hospitals, or critical infrastructure.

And we need to sacrifice our own comfort to stay as a united as possible to support who definitely needs electricity more than we do. I am right now in a backup generator. And in Kyiv, and other large cities we have a scheduled electricity outages. As of right now 40 percent of Ukrainian energy infrastructure is either destroyed or damaged. And though we are trying to fix it, the attacks on their energy infrastructure continue breaking what we already fixed.

As of right now more than 1000s Ukrainian cities and villages experiencing electricity, either outages, or just complete blackouts. And this is what we are looking forward to have during the winter. So basically, Putin announced that this winter not only will be cold for us, but it will also be dark.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, President Zelenskyy warned that Moscow is trying to provoke a quote, wave of resettlement by cutting off electricity and water. Are you expecting to see more Ukrainians because they don't have access to these essentials in the next few weeks and possibly months, start to leave their cities again as we saw the early migration there in February after the initial days of invasion into neighboring European countries?

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RUDIK: Yes, we have talked to Polish and Czech officials that it is possible that there will be like another wave of refugees. It hurts us a lot but people will be fleeing from cold and from inability just have a normal life because there is a huge difference when we are sitting in a bomb shelter, where it is warm, and where you can have internet and where you can heat water and the bomb shelter that is cold and dark.

And especially it's terrifying for children because, you know, we started making it as a game for them saying, OK, it will pass. This is what we are doing. It is temporary. But when it's dark, cold, it's a very, very, very scary game.

GOLODRYGA: All of this is happening while Russia is continuing to bombard your infrastructure there. There President Zelenskyy has said that that Russian forces have mined a critical dam there in the Nipper River, as Ukrainian forces are making more of an effort to retake Kherson. I'm just curious, given this strategy from the Russians right now, as they are training these newly mobilized troops, are you prepared to not only have to focus on your infrastructure there, but for yet another round of perhaps intensified fighting once these troops are trained, and in a matter of weeks, on the front in the east?

RUDIK: Yes, we are prepared on all the sides. We are also training our troops and they are receiving trainings in different European countries. We are trying to regain as much territory as possible before the winter hits. And we understand that these next one and half months will be critical for us in all the matters infrastructure wise, battlefield wise, and the availability of intercept the (inaudible) shells.

You know what is frightening right now is that on the eighth month of war, we are still asking and begging for the same thing that on the day one, help us to protect our skies, help us to make to make sure that it's only the battlefield where we have to be concentrated at.

That we at least can make sure that our people in the peaceful cities are safe. And it is incredible that still eight months later, we are - don't have this defense. And we still are afraid of the rockets and Kamikaze drones that can come from the sky and kill us. And what we love this. This is so terrifying. GOLODRYGA: And it's terrifying to watch. I can only imagine what it's like to be living it there, Kira. The US and the West have promised to expedite their delivery of air defense systems. But as you said, you've needed these for months now. Kira Rudik, thank you so much for joining us. Be safe.

RUDIK: Thank you and Glory to Ukraine.

GOLODRYGA: Thank you. And still ahead, Latinos are the fastest growing voter bloc in the country. And polling shows they're listening to both parties. Up next we'll speak with Congressman Ruben Gallego about the critical race to reach Latino voters ahead of the midterms.

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