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CNN Projects Democrat Warnock Wins Senate Race; Ukraine Reports New Russian Strikes in Zaporizhzhia Region; Moscow Accuses Ukraine of Drone Attacks Inside Russia; China Announces Further Easing of COVID- 19 Restrictions. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired December 07, 2022 - 04:30   ET

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

[04:30:00]

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: Well, Capitol Hill is waking up to a new reality this morning with a 51-49 majority for Democrats in the U.S. Senate. That's all thanks to voters in Georgia who have reelected Raphael Warnock. CNN projects Warnock will win the Georgia runoff by a slim margin. It's his second runoff victory in just two years. Warnock will defeat former Republican challenger former football star Herschel Walker and now serve a full six-year term in the Senate. Walker carried the vast majority of Georgia's rural counties while Senator Warnock ran up the margins in the cities, especially Atlanta. He promised that in his first full term he will represent all Georgians.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. RAPHAEL WARNOCK (D-GA): But here's my promise to you, I will walk with you even as I work for you. Because here is what I've learned as a pastor, you can't lead the people unless you love the people. You can't love the people unless you know the people and you can't know the people unless you walk among the people. You cannot serve me if you cannot see me. And so, during these difficult days, even as I work on specific public policy proposals and I offer bills and work with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to get those bills passed, I just want you to know that I see you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GOLODRYGA: The White House posted this photo of President Joe Biden calling Warnock to congratulate him.

The caption: Tonight, Georgia voters stood up for our democracy, read ejected ultra-MAGA-ism and most importantly sent a good man back to the Senate.

So, let's continue the discussion with our panel. Maria, let me turn to you now. What does Warnock's victory do for President Biden's agenda for the next two years, especially given that control of the House will go to Republicans?

[04:35:00]

MARIA CARDONA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: It's a big deal, Bianna, so I'm glad you are asking it. Because some would say, look, Democrats already had control of the Senate at 50-50. So, you know, what is really one more count? You know, how much more of a big deal is it? And it is because at 51 it's going to give us control over the committees that oversee the Senate and all of the issues that the Senate has jurisdiction. And that I think is incredibly important. And I will not under estimate some of the reasons why voters might have gone to the polls especially on our side and, frankly, independents as well as they saw House Republicans and Kevin McCarthy really focus on instead of the things they promised during the election of governing and focusing on solutions for inflation, the economy, crime, border, all of the things that they talked about that Democrats did so horribly and that Republicans were going to come in and change, instead what is the first thing that they announce?

They announce investigations. They threaten impeachment. They want to have Biden's cabinet resign or else. And so that to me indicates -- and I think frankly to a lot of voters indicates that Republican leadership, Republican control actually means additional chaos, more chaos, not governing.

And so, I think that gave an additional reason for people to go to the polls in Georgia to say, look, we want reasonable solutions. We want people who are going to be focusing on our problems. And that's why I think Warnock was so smart when he continues to talk about bringing everyone together, representing everyone in Georgia, including the people who did not vote for him. Because his message along be with so many Democrats that won in the Senate, and frankly, a lot in the House too, where we also did a lot better than expectations is because we focused on solutions. We focused on bringing people together. We focused on governing. And that I think did Democrats a lot of good.

GOLODRYGA: And Karen let's pick up on that. That's a good point that Maria raises. Because Warnock went out of his way not to only appeal to progressives in the state but to moderates as well and even those Republicans who were not willing to vote or a bit, let's just say, upset with some of Herschel Walker's rhetoric and his past. And we saw Warnock continue throughout this campaign to talk about his work across the aisle with Republicans. Now that he will be back in the Senate for another six years, what do you make of this hope, at least, for more bipartisanship not only in this lame duck, obviously, but in 2023 ahead?

KAREN FINNEY, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, it's going to be a challenge. It should be but I think it will be as Maria pointed out. We know that the agenda on the House side is going to be driven by investigations. That being said, now that Democrats have full control, real control of the Senate, it does give some leverage to try to reach out, you know, to the other chamber to say, look, many people are up for re-election in 2024. We need to get a few things done and to try to see if there are some small places where perhaps they can move some things forward.

But the other thing that I think is critically important, couple things here, it gives Democrats in the Senate the opportunity to, as some of us in Washington would say, stop bad things from happening. So, some of the legislative or some of the more message type legislation that may come from the Republicans in the House will be stopped by Democrats in the Senate.

And that will also set up, again, because one of the things as Charlie was mentioning the Republicans have to worry about is the extremism label. Not just Trump but Trumpism. And so, you know, the more you see Democrats, both in the House and now in the Senate really talking about solutions, that says -- you know, leaves out of the equation what are the Republicans going to do? And if you then see Republicans in the House being more extreme and you don't see Republicans in the Senate willing to work with Democrats, again, that sets up sort of a messaging narrative going into the 2024 elections where we have both the presidential and a pretty tough Senate map as well.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, and we can definitely expect to see some of that Republican extremism up ahead for Kevin McCarthy if he does happen to be elected as Speaker of the House and some of the headaches that will be coming his way. Panel, stick with us. Still to come, the key take aways from the Georgia runoff including some painful lessons for Republicans.

[04:40:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GOLODRYGA: And as we wrap things up for this hour, I want to get some final thoughts from our panel on the election results. April Ryan let's start with you.

APRIL RYAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: It was a concession speech and the victory speech. Herschel Walker with the concession speech was the clearest we've ever heard him in his extemporaneous talk to the crowd and he also talked about supporting the Constitution, something that the man who supported him, Donald Trump, is walking away from.

And then with Raphael Warnock, he talked about politics being personal. How he's walking with the people even though they may not have voted with him in trying to get things done, unity across the aisle. Those are the two take aways for me.

GOLODRYGA: The bar is really low when we are applauding people for supporting the Constitution and yet, here we are. Charlie Dent your thoughts?

CHARLIE DENT, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, real quick. Look, candidates may matter less, but they still matter a lot. That's the bottom line. The you can't nominate, you know, horrible candidates in this case and then hope to win general elections and of course Donald Trump's very disastrous influence on the nomination process in the party has proven catastrophic. Catastrophic, full stop.

GOLODRYGA: Maria.

CARDONA: Well, all of that is true, the challenge for Republicans is going to be will they be able to quit Donald Trump? Because they still haven't. They keep saying everything that he has done is the death nell, it's over, they're going to switch lanes, they're going to turn the page. But right now, Donald Trump is still the biggest draw among Republican voters. The most popular person who is up for 2024. So, will they be able to do it? If they can't, Joe Biden will win again. If they do, I think it could be a new day for the Republican Party and American politics.

GOLODRYGA: Karen Finney, do you agree?

[04:45:00]

FINNEY: I do, but I just want to say to the voters of Georgia, your vote matters. I always use Georgia as an example to remind people how much voting actually matters. Twice now it's the voters of Georgia who literally have fundamentally helped to change the direction of this country.

And I think what that says for the Democratic party is we need to continue to learn the lessons of how important our ground game is. The that has a lot to do with how and why we won in Georgia. I worked on the 2021 special election. So, let's keep learning those lessons.

For the Republican Party, well, it's nice to see them finally talking about quitting Donald Trump, this is not a profile in courage. It is the American people who stood up and stood firm and said, no, we're not going back to 2020, we're moving forward.

GOLODRYGA: Jackie Kucinich, ultimately, we have a Democrat who won in what was a red state, but it was still by a narrow margin. What does that say about the future of the party in that state and what we can expect in the next two years?

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I mean, I think you can't discount you have two kind of behemoths of a ground game working against each other. You can't deny that Stacey Abrams machine that she built over years helped propel Raphael Warnock. And on the same token you had Brian Kemp's machine behind Herschel Walker.

So, the mobilization really does matter and -- but I think to kind of put a button in it, what everyone here is saying, I mean, election denialism ultimately lost this entire cycle. Across the country there were fair elections and they were both -- you know, not a lot of -- I think there was concern that votes took some time to be counted, but all in all those who questioned the integrity of the U.S. election system lost.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, kudos to the election system, to all those people, all the election workers and to the voters in Georgia who now came out for their fourth election in two years. They deserve a round of applause in that state. Jackie Kucinich, Maria Cardona, April Ryan , Charlie Dent, Karen Finney, it's been a really thoughtful and fun hour with you. Thank you so much for joining us.

I'm Bianna Golodryga and that does it for me here in New York. I'm going to send it over to my friend Bianca Nobilo in CNN London.

BIANCA NOBILO, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you so much Bianna. Still ahead, Moscow accusing Ukraine of a series of attacks carried out deep inside Russia. Why this could hint at a new stage of drone warfare. [04:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

NOBILO: Ukrainian officials say Russian missiles and drone attacks hit villages in southern Ukraine today wounding three people. The regional governor in Zaporizhzhia says one hurt is a 15-year-old girl and the attack destroyed or damaged about 20 homes across two villages.

Meanwhile, a Russian-backed officials in the occupied city of Donetsk says Ukrainian shelling has killed four people and wounded 19 in the past 24 hours. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Eastern Ukraine on Tuesday, where he said the country's path to independence lies to a free Donetsk Luhansk and Crimea. For more on this development Scott McLean joins me now. Scott let's return to these drone attacks that occurred in Russia. So far, we know that the Ukrainians have been asking the Americans for the type of technology capable of perpetrating these attacks but they haven't got it. So, where did they get it from?

SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, this is --

NOBILO: If indeed it was Ukraine. It's been hinted at but not confirmed.

MCLEAN: Yes, that's right. Officially the Ukrainians have denied this. But you're right, there's a lot of questions for the Americans right now because they're the largest arms supplier to Ukraine. But officially their policy has been to not supply these kind of weapons because, of course, they're worried about a multitude of things. But primarily they're worried that any strikes deep inside of Russian territory could intentionally escalate this kind of conflict.

So, American officials from State and from the Defense Department were asked this over and over again, some version of the same question. The State Department's spokesperson, Ned Price was asked point blank whether or not the U.S. had provided these weapons and he said very plainly, no. Another State Department official Victoria Newman was asked whether the U.S. policy on not providing these weapons had changed at all. She also said very plainly, no.

And so, perhaps though because we also know that there is a Ukrainian state-owned weapon manufacturer that said that it has developed the capability of long-range drones and successfully tested them, perhaps the U.S. is enabling that kind of development. And so, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was asked about that yesterday and here's his answer.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTONY BLINKEN, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We have neither encouraged nor enabled the Ukrainians to strike inside of Russia, but the important thing is to understand what Ukrainians are living through every day with the ongoing Russian aggression against their country.

(END VIDEO CLIP) MCLEAN: So, not enabling, not encouraging according to Antony Blinken. But the Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was asked whether the U.S. was doing anything to prevent Ukraine from getting those kinds of weapons and his answer was, no. So, not encouraging, not preventing either.

NOBILO: Scott McLean, thank you.

MCLEAN: You bet.

NOBILO: Well, in a wave of protests, China says it's easing more of its COVID-19 restrictions. Authorities have announced a sweeping set of new guidelines and they largely scrapped the controversial health code system that allowed people to quarantine at home. China's foreign ministry says the changes are, quote, keeping pace with the times.

For more let's go to CNN's Anna Coren live from Hong Kong. In that statement keeping pace with the times, Anna, but this does all appear to be concessions in response to the protests. What implications does that have for a government which, you know, is perceived as being able to essentially do whatever it wants despite popular dissent?

ANNA COREN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Bianca, I really think that this is China, you know, beginning to dismantle its zero-COVID policy that's been in place for nearly three years.

[04:55:00]

The National Health Commission announced ten measures earlier today. They include allowing those who are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms to quarantine at home. There will be no mass lockdowns of neighborhoods, instead authorities will target just apartments and buildings. Authorities will reduce mass PCR test being and unless, you know, high-risk areas. And most importantly, Bianca, the vaccination program for the elderly will now be accelerated. Three years in -- hard to believe -- that it's now going to be accelerated. Only 66 percent of people over the age of 80 have actually received two shots and experts say that they need three shots of the Chinese vaccine for it to be effective.

Now as you mention, it comes following these nationwide protests which began at the end of last month after a fire killed ten people in a sealed off building in Zhenjiang which firefighters could not reach. The protests obviously rattled the government. And as of last week, we started seeing restrictions ease in various cities. And while China has yet to downgrade its COVID status which is on par with cholera and the bubonic plague. Authorities are now saying that the one size fits all approach is no longer appropriate. But certainly, a huge step in the right direction for the people of China -- Bianca.

NOBILO: CNN's Anna Coren, thank you so much.

In Germany police have arrested 25 people suspected of being far right extremists plotting to overthrow the government. The federal prosecutor's office says the arrests were made across the country. Suspects are thought to be members or supporters of a group called "Reich Citizens Movement." They're suspected of planning armed attacks. Authorities say earlier today that raids were ongoing and there are dozens of other suspects.

That does it here on CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Bianca Nobilo in London. "CNN THIS MORNING" is next.

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