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FBI Receives First Evidence From Chinese Balloon; First UN Aid Convoy Gets Into Syria, But Crossing Still Difficult; Florida House Approves Bill To Give DeSantis New Power Over Disney. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired February 09, 2023 - 15:00   ET

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

JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: "Evan handled this unfortunate situation with true professionalism, and we appreciate his commitment as a journalist whose goal is to report stories that are fair and unbiased. On a positive front, I just spoke with Evan a short time ago and he was calm, cool, collected and already talking about his next assignment."

He was released from a county jail on bail last night, but I'm sure his lawyers are going to have a lot of questions, because clearly he had a constitutional right like we all do to be there to report the story. Of course, waiting for more details in terms of what happened here.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: Yes. I just wonder at no point in this timeline did no one say, this seems excessive.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN HOST: Right.

BLACKWELL: Like he's standing here reporting and I was watching NewsNation at the time. He was in the middle of a report and said, "We've just been asked to stop reporting and I'm stopping," and then this happens.

CARROLL: Right. Again, from what we could hear he was just being told he was being too loud.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

GOLODRYGA: Yes.

BLACKWELL: Jason Carroll, thank you.

GOLODRYGA: Jason, thank you.

It is the top of the hour CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Bianna Golodryga.

BLACKWELL: I'm Victor Blackwell.

Right now the FBI is evaluating the Chinese spy balloon recovered in the Atlantic this weekend. These are new pictures handed over by the bureau. Officials say understanding its components could be important pieces of evidence for future criminal charges that could be brought.

GOLODRYGA: Just moments ago, the State Department told reporters they are looking into taking further action against China for the balloon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NED PRICE, STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESPERSON: We're always going to protect our interests, we did so in the tactical case of this balloon. We also said today in the release that you mentioned that we're exploring - taking action against PRC entities linked to the PLA that supported the balloon's incursion into us airspace. We'll look at continuing these broader efforts to expose and to address the PRC's larger surveillance activities that pose a threat to our national security and that to our allies and partners as well.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GOLODRYGA: Today, White House officials briefed both chambers of Congress on what they've learned so far about the spy craft. Among the revelations, it was part of a multi continent Chinese spy campaign and was capable of monitoring communications here in the United States.

Let's bring in CNN Chief Congressional Correspondent, Manu Raju, and CNN's Senior Justice Correspondent, Evan Perez. Evan to you first, what more are you learning about the FBI's investigation so far?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Bianna and Victor, it's because of that intelligence, the communications collection aspect of this balloon that the FBI is involved and now they are analyzing the first components that have been brought back from the Atlantic Ocean.

They're now - you see pictures there - at the FBI lab in Quantico. They were - they've only recovered limited parts of it. The umbrella - the balloon canopy, some wiring and some of the smaller electronic parts. The bulk of what they call the payload, which is the electronics gathering equipment, the spy equipment is still at the bottom of the ocean, dozens of feet below.

You see pictures there of the FBI, their divers along with the Navy divers are working together, being hampered a little bit by the weather to try to recover those pieces and bring them back for analysis. We talked to a senior FBI official on a call earlier today. And they were telling us that this is the first time that the FBI has actually had a chance to analyze and to check one of these balloons, because despite the fact that we've - they have been a number of these that have gone through U.S. airspace, none have been brought in for analysis.

So they believe that this will present a trove - treasure trove really, a treasure trove of information for the intelligence community to learn a lot more about what the Chinese are up to.

BLACKWELL: Manu, tell us about this resolution passed by the House today.

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it was actually passed on a bipartisan basis to condemn the action of the Chinese government. This coming after the House and the Senate each had the closed door briefings, classified briefings about everything that has been learned so far. In the House briefing, though it was tense and it was - it would came down in some ways along party lines. Republicans including some conservative members attacking the administration over their handling of this issue, including Congressman Marjorie Taylor Greene.

The administration briefers pushed back, they detailed their timeline about why the decisions are made to ultimately shoot down the balloon after it traveled across the United States and after it came off the coast of North Carolina. Now, they said that - and according to sources who were familiar with that closed door meeting, they say little intelligence was gleaned from the - by the Chinese throughout its course of this trek across the United States. They said that's because essentially it stopped transmitting intelligence once the U.S. learned about this balloon.

And also they said that the U.S. believes that what they recovered is just simply not going to be nearly as much as what the Chinese found was not going to be as much as what the U.S. will ultimately recover from the balloon, the crashed balloon that was shot down.

[15:05:03]

Now, the U.S. believes also according to sources familiar with the matter that the - that this was perhaps not dispatched by Xi Jinping, instead, the balloon may have been some rogue actor the Chinese government may have sent this balloon to the United States. It's something that they plan to investigate further.

And they also try to make the case that they didn't move earlier to shoot down the balloon because of concerns of military escalation, potential military escalation. They took steps too early here on the process. And when I asked Congressman Mike Gallagher about this, he's a Republican who leads a select subcommittee on China, he pushed back.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: You don't know what you know, do you think the U.S. was right to wait to shoot down the balloon?

REP. MIKE GALLAGHER (R-WI): No.

RAJU: Why do you say that? They seem to think that it could have escalated military tensions with China or maybe even ...

GALLAGHER: Well, that's buying into the CCP's narrative about us defending our own airspace and sovereignty is provocative. I don't buy that.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): I'm confident that the administration made the right judgment about when they shut it down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: So the viewpoint of coming down along party lines for the most part of Democrats defending the administration's decisions, but there was some Republicans who did agree with the administration's handling of this, including Sen. Mitt Romney who emerged from this closed door briefing and I asked him whether or not he believes that the United States made the right decision in shooting down the balloon ultimately towards the end of the process here and he said, "Yes, he does." And that's different than what we're hearing from Kevin McCarthy and other top Republicans who believed that U.S. mishandled this issue.

GOLODRYGA: Manu, it's interesting that they inevitably landed on criticizing this resolution China, because I know that there had been some consideration among Republicans to direct their frustration and this resolution at the Biden administration itself, what changed?

RAJU: Yes, they were concerned about it appearing to political to go after Joe Biden. So behind the scenes, the leadership made the decision to instead change this language to instead condemned the Chinese government. That's a decision that Speaker McCarthy made in a closed door meeting earlier this week along with his top deputies. And if they were to go along party lines, perhaps the vote would come down along party lines.

They contended they wanted to speak with one voice, which is why there was such a resounding vote in the House today to condemn the actions of the Chinese government. Otherwise, you would have seen these long party lines and potentially some GOP defections could have made even passage of that resolution even harder, guys.

BLACKWELL: Manu Raju, Evan Perez, thank you.

GOLODRYGA: Well, President Biden is in Florida today continuing his post State of the Union tour. Today he is visiting the University of Tampa to drive home his pledge to protect Social Security and Medicare all while trying to draw a sharp contrast with his potential 2024 challengers, two of whom we should note are Floridians.

BLACKWELL: But today he specifically focused on Republican Florida Sen. Rick Scott, citing Scott's plan to sunset all federal legislation every five years. Sen. Scott tweeted this just a minute ago - about an hour ago, I should say: "Since you can't stop talking about me and lying to Floridians about Social Security and Medicare, I'm sure you'll accept my invitation to debate the issue."

CNN White House Correspondent Arlette Saenz is with us now. So did the President say anything about that?

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, he certainly spent a big portion of his speech discussing Sen. Rick Scott and Social Security and Medicare. And the President really showed no signs of backing down from this fight with Republicans as he's trying to paint himself and Democrats as the defenders of those programs.

Now, the President traveled to Florida, a rich - that has a very high senior and retiree population, which benefits from these types of programs. And the President really was eager to highlight that proposal from Sen. Rick Scott. You saw the President waving a pamphlet in the air outlining that plan which called for the sunsetting of federal legislation, all federal legislation every five years, including Social Security and Medicare.

Now, a Rick Scott today was on air defending himself saying that he does not have plans to cut Social Security and Medicare, but this is clearly an argument that - a fight that the White House is eager to wage with Republicans. And President Biden down in Florida was really relishing in the moment that happened at the State of the Union on Tuesday and the fact that he hit a nerve with Republicans.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't know who they think they are. We saw on Tuesday night Republicans don't like me being called out on this. They were not very happy with me pointing this out. But their words speak - look, I know that a lot of Republicans their dream is to cut Social Security and Medicare. Well, let me say this, if that's your dream, I'm your nightmare.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: Look, all of this is coming as the White House is preparing for those battles with Republicans when it comes to the debt ceiling. Additionally, the President also talked about trying to lower prescription drug costs and health care costs and pointed to how some Republicans want to repeal the inflation Reduction Act, which included caps on insulin and also the ability for Medicare to negotiate lower prescription drug costs.

[15:10:11]

Now, all of this argument today was playing out against the backdrop in the backyard of two key Republicans in Florida, that's Gov. Ron DeSantis and former President Donald Trump who could very well be President Biden's chief Republican rivals, should he launch a 2024 bid.

The President did make brief mention of both men in his remarks but really focus most of his attacks directly on Florida Sen. Rick Scott. Of course, the President has said that it is his intention to run but he is still waiting to make that final decision about 2024.

BLACKWELL: All right. All of this part of the expected ramp up to that announcement, Arlette Saenz in the White House. Thank you, Arlette.

The numbers coming out of Turkey and Syria are heartbreaking, more than 20,000 people now have died from the devastating earthquake. The rescues though they are still happening. A family of three was pulled out of the rubble, you see here are being carried in a blanket a 10- year-old boy.

He and his brother and mother were trapped for 78 hours.

GOLODRYGA: Wow.

BLACKWELL: Rescuers heard a voice and then they worked all night to pull them out. GOLODRYGA: That's why we've been focusing on why they take that time when things get so quiet there in case they do hear any survivors they're in the rubble.

BLACKWELL: Mm-hm.

GOLODRYGA: Meanwhile, help is pouring in from around the world. But the delivery of urgent supplies to hard hit areas of northern Syria is being complicated by long running civil war.

CNN's Salma Abdelaziz has the latest.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN REPORTER: We're at an aid distribution center in the heart of Istanbul. It's actually just a huge hanger that's been turned into this massive space for hundreds of volunteers to try to pack these boxes with any supplies that have been donated. Just take a look inside. It's the basics that people need, right, food, sanitation kits, diapers, clothes, blankets, canned goods and everyone you are looking here - looking at here is packing as fast as they can.

I want to walk you through this scene a little bit more. It looks like chaos, but it is organized. There are coordinators shouting orders, we got loud speakers, everyone is working as quickly as they possibly can. They know that every second counts, because every single thing you see here has been donated by Turks for Turks, whether it comes from individuals or families or businesses.

Just keep on following me through here just to see how huge this operation is. Each of these boxes gets packed here again and then on the other side of this hanger, we have those trucks right there. They load them straight up into their truck and they take them right to that affected earthquake zone.

And we've spoken to these volunteers and they all tell us the same thing. They see the suffering. They see the heartbreak right there in the earthquake zone and they simply couldn't sit at home and do nothing. This here is Turkey coming together, a true sense of solidarity.

Salma Abdelaziz, CNN, Istanbul.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GOLODRYGA: Solidarity in the face of tragedy and crisis there. Our thanks to Salma Abdelaziz. And for more information about how you can help victims of the earthquake in Turkey and Syria go to cnn.com/impact for a list of vetted organizations.

BLACKWELL: Pennsylvania senator, John Fetterman, as you know, is a stroke survivor. He's in the hospital. He felt lightheaded. We'll talk about the latest that we know on his condition. That's next.

GOLODRYGA: And the Biden administration has just laid out a roadmap on how the country will transition out of the COVID-19 public health emergency. Ahead, what this means for you and your family.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:17:47]

BLACKWELL: Pennsylvania senator, John Fetterman, is in a hospital. He said yesterday that he started feeling lightheaded during a Democratic retreat.

GOLODRYGA: Now, he was admitted overnight for medical observation. You'll remember he suffered a stroke in May of last year at the height of his primary campaign.

CNN Capitol Hill Reporter Melanie's Nona is with us with an update on his condition. Melanie, the doctors say there are no signs that he had another stroke, so what did they think happened?

MELANIE ZANONA, CNN CAPITOL HILL REPORTER: Well, there's no word yet on exactly what caused this scary episode. They were running additional tests and if all goes well, the senator could be released as early as today. But let me walk you through what happened here, according to his office.

So this all started yesterday, when Fetterman was attending the democratic retreat here in D.C. The Senator started to feel lightheaded and so his staffers took him to the hospital where they ran some tests. They kept him overnight for observation. But the good news is there are no signs, according to his doctors, that he did suffer another stroke.

But clearly Fetterman is taking this very seriously given his medical history. As you mentioned, last spring he suffered a stroke when he was on the campaign trail. He was hospitalized for over a week. He had a defibrillator put in and he has been recovering from that stroke. He's had some auditory issues that he's been struggling with.

But again, the good news here, no signs that he did suffer another stroke and we're hoping it stays that way, guys.

BLACKWELL: Melanie, what do you know about this Minnesota congresswoman who was attacked?

ZANONA: Yes, another scary incident involving a member of Congress. So we learned today that earlier this morning, Congresswoman Angie Craig was assaulted in her elevator in her D.C. apartment building. There are no signs that this was a politically motivated attack. And luckily the Congresswoman is physically okay although she did suffer some bruising according to her office.

And we are learning some new details about this attack. According to the police report, it occurred around seven in the morning, the Congresswoman spotted someone in the lobby of her building acting erratic. She entered the elevator and the suspect entered behind her and he started randomly doing push-ups in the elevator, some weird behavior there after that is when the attack occurred. Allegedly, the suspect punched the congresswoman on the chin, grabbed her neck. [15:20:02]

She fought back. She threw her hot coffee at him and then was able to escape and call 911. The suspect then fled the scene.

Now, we did reach out to the Metropolitan Police Department for comment, but they said the case remains under active investigation, Victor and Bianna?

GOLODRYGA: Wow.

BLACKWELL: Wow.

GOLODRYGA: It's frightening.

BLACKWELL: It certainly is.

ZANONA: Yes.

BLACKWELL: I hope she is all right. Melanie Zanona, thank you very much.

GOLODRYGA: Well, the Biden administration is rolling out its plan to transition out of the COVID-19 public health emergency.

BLACKWELL: The national emergency is set to end May 11th. The White House Sources tell CNN the goal is to clearly explain, layout what the declaration does mean and what it does not.

CNN Health Reporter Jacqueline Howard is here.

All right. So what is the plan?

JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN HEALTH REPORTER: Yes. Victor and Bianna, we just obtained a letter that Health and Human Services Secretary, Xavier Becerra, is sending to state governors today outlining what will be affected and will not be affected.

So as we look at this list, here's what will be affected when we see the end of the public health emergency. That includes certain Medicare and Medicaid waivers and flexibilities, that includes reporting certain COVID-19 data to the CDC. We'll see changes with what data is reported that includes coverage for testing and that also includes certain guidance documents for industry like biotechnology companies, for instance.

And lastly, it also includes possible changes to telehealth. However, there will be rulemaking to propose extending that. So this will be an ongoing conversation.

Now, what will not be affected according to this letter, emergency use authorizations for certain vaccines, treatments testing, you know that during the pandemic the FDA issued many authorizations, those are separate from the public health emergency declaration. Here's FDA commissioner, Dr. Robert Califf, talking about this to a congressional subcommittee just yesterday in a hearing. Have a listen. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ROBERT CALIFF, FDA COMMISSIONER: Our facts are also a little modest because our EUAs are independent of the public health emergency so we can keep them going as long as we need to. We've been preparing the industry since day one to be ready for the transition.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOWARD: And this transition, Victor and Bianna, is going to happen and about 90 days from today. So again, we expect to see more conversations about what the plan is and what will be affected in the coming weeks.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, that's going to happen about mid May. Also while we have you, I want to ask you about a new study that connects air pollution and teen's blood pressure, specifically having a bad impact on it. What more can you tell us about it?

HOWARD: Yes, Bianna, this study adds to, I would say, our view of air pollution as a public health threat. What was found - this was among more than 3,000 teens in the City of London - researchers looked at their blood pressure measurements and air pollution in the area. Here's what they found, high levels of nitrogen dioxide in the air was associated with lower blood pressure measurements and then particle pollutants were associated with higher blood pressure.

And we know that air pollution can impact not only your blood pressure, but circadian rhythms in your body as well as even kidney function. So this study adds to what we view which is air pollution adds, once again, a threat to our public health.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, more reason to take it seriously.

HOWARD: Exactly.

GOLODRYGA: Jacqueline Howard, thank you.

BLACKWELL: Florida lawmakers have just given Gov. DeSantis power over the famous Disney Park there in Florida. Details on the decision and what it means next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:28:13]

GOLODRYGA: Well, a big win for Republican governor, Ron DeSantis. Just moments ago, the Florida House of Representatives approved a bill to strip Disney of its control over the area and return it back to the state government.

BLACKWELL: CNN's Leyla Santiago has the details, so what happens now?

LEYLA SANTIAGO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Victor and Bianna. So now this will go to the Senate tomorrow where by all accounts we expect this to pass, but let's talk about what the House of Representatives actually voted on today. They gave it a pass 82 to 31, giving the Governor of Florida more power over who runs Walt Disney World essentially. He will now be able to appoint who runs the board of this special district that governs that.

Now by no means is it a simple setup, it's actually a very complicated setup. But back up a little bit. This is a special district that has been in place for more than half a century that essentially allows Disney up until now anyway to self govern, allowing it to kind of have control and maintain its own buildings and roads even have its own fire department.

They still will have that, but now who makes the decisions of that will be appointed by someone that is put in place by the Governor of Florida should this pass in the Senate tomorrow, which again is expected to happen. Republicans here will tell you this is about leveling the playing field, making sure that not one corporation has any sort of special privileges.

But Democrats on the floor today really made it a point to as one representative put it go to the root of this. They will talk about the history of how we got here.

[15:29:50]