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Hamlin Making Substantial Improvement; Ukraine Rejects Putin's Ceasefire; South Carolina Strikes Down Abortion Ban. Aired 9:30-10a ET

Aired January 06, 2023 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:30:00]

STEVE GONCALVES, FATHER OF KAYLEE GONCALVES: So, his mannerisms, his body language, I'm pretty Intune with what - with certain guys. I'm - I've - I have played sports my whole life. I've been in different gyms. I've been in conference rooms with white collar. I can sense confidence. And I did not sense that at all. I sensed somebody who was flaring, scared and worried.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: I'll tell you, Erica, I've been speaking with Steve for a number of weeks now and, you know, I sense -- you could see it in there, you sense exhaustion. I mean, of course, we would be having lost a child that way, but also this was the first time I sensed really more resolve there, right? I mean I think you -- what came across to me is, you heard him say there, he picked the wrong family. This suspect picked the wrong family. That there's a path to justice here, right, that he was expressing, but still heartbreak, right? I mean the way he described it, that his - his view is that this guy was hunting -- hunting those victims.

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Yes. And to hear him talk about, you know - and, you know, we know as parents, but to imagine as a parent to hear him say, you know, my daughter had her phone right there and she couldn't even call 911.

SCIUTTO: Yes. Yes.

HILL: How helpless he must feel. And I was also just really struck by his empathy and his grace and I think, again, just a testament to him as a parent. When you asked him the question that a lot of people have about the roommate who, according to the affidavit, was home, saw the -- who we believe was the suspect, right, but then there were no calls for eight hours.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

HILL: And him just saying, look, this is not a movie.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

HILL: This is just -- you know, you have to try to put yourself in that moment.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

HILL: I think it just, you know, speaks to -- speaks to who he is.

SCIUTTO: Good for him for saying that. I mean, as he said, petrified. I mean this is -- this is a girl, just out - just out of her teenage years who witnessed -- just you can imagine the fear in that moment.

Anyway, we'll keep on the story. A lot more to come.

HILL: Yes. A great interview, Jim.

Up next here, the remarkable progress for the Buffalo Bills Damar Hamlin. What doctors are now saying about his recovery and what they need for a full assessment of where he is in this moment. We're going to take you live to Buffalo. Dr. Sanjay Gupta also with us next.

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[09:36:44]

SCIUTTO: Well, this morning, CNN obtained just remarkable new audios of the moment that Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin collapsed, showing how urgent the emergency response was. Responders rushed to save Hamlin after that Monday night football game where he collapsed with a cardiac arrest.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go ahead and go over to the cot. I don't like how he went down.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're going to need everybody. All call. All call. We need everybody.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Come on, bring everybody. We need ever on dock (ph), everybody. Bring the cot with the medics, all of you, and get (INAUDIBLE) out here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Well, that tape underscored the relief Hamlin's family, teammates and fans felt in the last 24 hours as he has now regained consciousness. He cannot yet speak because he is still on a ventilator but is writing to communicate. His first question was, did we win? His doctor responded, you've won the game of life.

HILL: Yes. For more now let's bring in CNN sports anchor and former Bills safety, Coy Wire, and CNN chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

Good to see you both this morning.

I mean talk about so much emotion that we have seen from this team and even from the family of Damar Hamlin in the last 24 hours or so. The response, Coy, has really been something.

COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: So much emotion, Erica. I mean being around those players yesterday, though, they were glowing knowing that their teammate is progressing, though you can still see this heaviness. But one person helping them through this, their head coach Sean McDermott. This team and city had been rocked by a deadly mass shooting, a deadly snowstorm and now a teammate nearly dying on the field in front of them. But coach has been a pillar of strength. Mourning with, then rallying this team and city time and time again. Maybe the most significant impact, though, giving his players the power, the choice to not continue playing that game Monday night, considering their mental health. I asked team captain Mitch Morse about that unprecedented decision.

Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MITCH MORSE, BUFFALO BILLS CENTER: Yes, I just think there was no way in hell that we were ready to go out there and play a game. You know, even if there were just a few guys who weren't ready to play, which there were way more, you know what I mean, you can't -- to play this game, as you know, where you have to be mentally to be on the field, not only for yourself and your well-being but for others around you, it just would have done a disservice to everyone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WIRE: The rest of the NFL was watching, how the Buffalo Bills, Coach Sean McDermott, are leading. College, high school, youth players and coaches, they're watching. We can't yet quantify how powerful that decision was and in just over 48 hours or so they're going to step on to that field against division rivals New England Patriots to show Damar Hamlin, who is still fighting for his life, that they are fighting for him.

SCIUTTO: Dr. Gupta, so much great news in the last 24 hours, right? I mean he's awake. He's communicating. We did hear more from the hospital physician yesterday in effect about his status and also what happens next. Have a listen because I want to get your reaction.

[09:40:02]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. WILLIAM KNIGHT IV, EMERGENCY MEDICINE DIRECTOR, MLP PROGRAM: He's still on the ventilator. That does require still a little bit of sedation to make sure he's comfortable. Being on a ventilator is not the most comfortable thing. So, that, in fairness to Damar, has not been fully assessed in terms of even his awareness of everything that has happened in the last three days. That will come more as we have better assessment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: So, Sanjay, how does this type of recovery typically work and what better assessments are they talking about there?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, what he's describing, if you had to put a tone on it, is being cautiously optimistic. He's still critically ill. And sometimes the recovery can be a little bit of a roller coaster. So you can have good days and bad days and these things do play out over days and even weeks as opposed to hours and days. So, you've got to sort of widen the aperture of time here.

But the other sorts of tests, I mean one of the important ones that he talked about was assessing his neurological function. Someone goes without oxygenated blood for a period of time, how did that affect the brain? Was there an injury to the spinal cord? And, thankfully, it sounds like that the answer to both those questions is no. Those -- he's able to communicate, as you say. He's moving his hands and his feet. That's a great sign.

Impact on other organs, the kidneys, you know, the liver, things like that, that will be assessed over time. I think what he was responding to there specifically was about a concussion. And I think the point the doctors were making were -- was that, you know, he's still sedated because he's still on a breathing tube. And to assess for more specific things like concussion, that can take a while.

But, look, two and a half days after the injury is when that press conference took place. And that was -- it was a significantly optimistic look at things. I mean, you know, it -- just the day before he was still lying on his chest because he had -- they were having trouble actually oxygenating him. So, he's - that-- it was - it was good news, as you point out, all around yesterday.

HILL: Yes, really good news and so well-received and we know there is still so much good energy flowing his way.

Coy, Sanjay, appreciate it. Good to see you both. Thank you.

SCIUTTO: All right, still ahead, despite a so-called ceasefire by Russia in Ukraine, the air raid sirens, they're still sounding throughout the capital. We're going to go to Kyiv live, next.

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[09:46:41]

SCIUTTO: This morning, Ukrainian soldiers are observing orthodox Christmas. This as the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has called for a ceasefire through the holiday. However, CNN teams on the ground say that ceasefire is not sticking. They've witnessed incoming and outgoing artillery on the front lines in just the last few hours.

HILL: CNN's Scott McLean is in Kyiv this morning. Air raid sirens have been sounding today. So, Ukraine didn't agree to this ceasefire, it's important to point out, Scott.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

HILL: We've heard about some fire. What else are you learning?

SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, this ceasefire agreement was essentially doomed from the get-go because, of course, the Ukrainians never signed on to it. They never agreed to it. And so it is, for all intents and purposes, business as usual on the front lines in Ukraine and, frankly, in the rest of the country as well.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that this was just Russians taking advantage of a potential ceasefire to get troops closer to the front lines, to resupply the front lines, perhaps get better positioning along the front lines, and they weren't going to allow that to happen.

And the Russians also made abundantly clear that this was not a free pass for the Ukrainians either. They said that if they were fired on, they would fire back. And they also said that Ukrainians wouldn't be allowed to simply improve their position on the battlefield, that they would also strike in that case as well.

So, given that the Ukrainians were treating this as any other day, it was doomed to fail from the get-go. And that is what we're seeing on the front lines.

And even a couple of hours into the ceasefire supposedly beginning, the air raid sirens, as you mentioned, went off in Kyiv and across the country. That doesn't necessarily mean there was a missile incoming, but certainly a lot of Ukrainians here rolled their eyes and thought, I told you so.

In fact, I was at a church service earlier today for soldiers led by the head of the orthodox church of Ukraine, and I interviewed him briefly afterwards. And after hearing the sirens, he said, look, we don't trust what the Russians said. Just look at the air raid sirens coming in. They say that there can only be -- he said that there can only be peace in this country if the Russians get out of Ukraine.

Jim. Erica.

SCIUTTO: Scott McLean, in Kyiv, thanks so much.

HILL: Up next, a major win for abortion rights advocates in South Carolina. The state supreme court blocking that state's six-week abortion ban. So, what's next for the laws there?

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:53:08]

HILL: A major development out of South Carolina where the state supreme court struck down a six-week abortion ban saying that it violates state constitution and rights to privacy. That 2021 law, you may recall, banned abortions once a so-called fetal heartbeat is detected. There is, of course, what is actually referred to as fetal cardiac activity that can be detected four to six weeks into a pregnancy. There were exceptions in that law for fetal anomalies and also risk to the life of the mother and, in some cases, of rape or incest.

SCIUTTO: CNN justice correspondent Jessica Schneider joins us now live with the details.

So, this is really interesting because this, you were saying to me in the break, state supreme court word on this is final in the state of South Carolina.

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: It is. Yes, the takeaway here is that this can't be appeal and that South Carolina actually now must allow abortions up until 22 weeks. It's one of the other southern states allowing that much time. So there really is no path to appeal here since this was a matter of state constitutional law.

This was decided by the state's highest court. There's no avenue to appeal. This decision did not invoke federal law. So instead the governor here, Republican Henry McMaster, he's saying that they're going to look at legislative options to maybe try to bring this six- week ban back or some semblance of it back.

But, you know, given the state supreme court's ruling here, that actually could be a tough road. This ruling was 3-2 and the majority of this state's highest court, they ruled in particular that the state constitution's right to privacy provision, that is what prohibits this abortion ban in this early stage of pregnancy, about six weeks, way before many women even realize that they are pregnant. So, the court here said, the state may be able to limit abortion in some sense, but it said this, any such limitation must be reasonable and it must be meaningful in that the timeframes imposed must afford a woman sufficient time to determine she is pregnant and to take reasonable steps to terminate that pregnancy.

[09:55:03]

So, saying really that six weeks is just too early here.

The two justices dissenting, though, said that the South Carolina legislature, they're the ones who have the ultimate authority to determine when to ban abortion, not the court.

So, a 3-2 split here, Jim. So it's possible that at this point, given what the governor said, the state AG, they're going to go back to the state legislature and try to work out some other law here and maybe ban abortion a bit past six weeks.

SCIUTTO: Right.

SCHNEIDER: Or maybe allow for more exceptions here. So it's probably in the state legislature's hands as to how it proceeds here. But the takeaway is that abortion is legal in South Carolina up until 22 weeks right now.

SCIUTTO: Yes, an interesting precedent on privacy as relevant.

SCHNEIDER: Yes.

SCIUTTO: Jessica Schneider, thanks so much.

Coming up next, we're going to go back to Capitol Hill where another major day is unfolding amid Kevin McCarthy's continuing quest for the speaker of the House. Lawmakers also are making the second anniversary, if you can believe it, of the January 6th insurrection. They're going to mark it just moments from now. We'll have it all live coming up.

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