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Thousands Wait for Aid to Arrive Three Days After Turkey-Syria Earthquake; Pentagon: 100 Percent Certain Balloon Not Civilian Craft; Growing Calls for Resignation of Republican George Santos; FBI Electronics Expert to Continue Testimony in Alex Murdaugh Trial. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired February 09, 2023 - 04:30   ET

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

[04:30:00]

MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: And he got a pretty positive response, didn't he, from the Brits.

BIANCA NOBILO, CNN ANCHOR: He did, absolutely. I think there is more unity in the British Parliament which has taken quite a trailblazing approach to supplying Ukraine with lethal aid. And another function of this, of course, is for Zelenskyy to express his gratitude and obviously hopes for the expansion.

FOSTER: Yes and was pretty clear yesterday when he was in London that Britain would need the support of allies to supply the jets. So that's what this part of the visit is probably about.

These are the other top stories were following this hour.

President Biden is heading to Florida later today where he'll push his economic plans including strengthening social safety net programs such as Social Security, Medicare.

And the death toll in Monday's earthquake that hit Turkey and Syria has passed 16,000. Rescue workers are working against the clock to find any remaining survivors.

NOBILO: Many in Turkey and Syria are still waiting for help to arrive three days after Monday's powerful earthquake.

FOSTER: And Syrian government says it has set up more than 100 shelters with aid supplies and turned dozens of mosques into relief centers. State media report nearly 300,000 people have been displaced by the quake and that's only in the parts of Syria under government control.

NOBILO: Meanwhile, Turkey's President is expected to visit more hard- hit areas today. And officials at the only border crossing between the two countries say they are expecting the first convoy of aid to cross into Syria by midday.

FOSTER: And Michael Capponi, president and founder of U.S. based disaster relief nonprofit Global Empowerment Mission. He joins us now from Kyiv where he's been overseeing the team's response efforts to Turkey. Thank you so much for joining us. Criticism coming through of the Turkish government not having any plans in place for events like this, and not managing the coordination effort properly. What's been your experience of that?

MICHAEL CAPPONI, PRESIDENT AND FOUNDER, GLOBAL EMPOWERMENT MISSION: I have the exact opposite experience. We've been working directly with the Turkish Embassy out of Washington D.C., they introduced us to the Miami consulate. We made a partnership with Turkish airlines. We have a warehouse in Miami it's about 60,000 square feet. And every single day now for the last two days, hundreds of palates are being transported from the headquarters to the airport and the supplies have already arrived in Istanbul. And we've had distributions going on in multiple areas as you can see.

NOBILO: And we're into now into more than day four after the devastating earthquake or series of earthquakes and aftershocks. How does the relief and aid that is urgently required change as the days go on?

CAPPONI: Well, it is cold, so enormous amounts of blankets. Sheltering is key right now, which is basically bedding, sheltering, food, everything for a shelter. And then as it evolves, right, I mean, we have a lot of experience in earthquakes. We spent the, you know, first year in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake.

And this is a very large scale. I mean, when we were dealing with Surfside in Miami, for example, imagine all the attention that was around Surfside, that was one building with 100 casualties. And this is basically that multiplied by -- I would say 10,000. Everywhere you look, there is a Surfside of a building collapse with people trying to be rescued. So, the survivors will need to relocate and get new housing and new places. They'll have to get back on their feet. And then it's just going to be a very long process.

So, we've already set up infrastructure -- because you need large infrastructure to respond to this. If you see in the background, in our Kyiv operations, right, we have whole multitude of operations going on simultaneously here for the last year. So we have to set that up at the Mersin port in Turkey. And then this way we're able to have kind of a pipeline of constant aid flowing for the next year to be able to properly respond.

FOSTER: The building you were dealing with in Surfside was very different, wasn't it. I'm hearing that, you know, you're really getting a sense of how these buildings in Turkey just weren't ready to withhold a shock like this even though it is an earthquake zone.

CAPPONI: In all my experience, this is by far the worst natural disaster that I've ever seen in my lifetime. It's -- the scale of it is unbelievable and the piles of rubble don't even look like rubble, they look like sand. It looks like everything like just broke. Sometimes we're hearing that, you know, some of these buildings got both earthquakes. So, like half of it crumbled and then the other half, you know, turned to dust after that. So it's been quite a lot for these people. We're also trying to figure out, you know, the situation with helping

Syria, which is not easy right now due to the circumstances to actually get aid in there. So right now we're limited to only supplying Turkey, but we will find some ways to help Syria too.

[04:35:00]

FOSTER: OK, Michael Capponi, thank you very much indeed. Incredible work they're all doing they're against odds of course. If you want to help the victims of the earthquake, do visit globalempowermentmission.org. You can also CNN.com/impact for other organizations working there.

A U.S. official tell CNN the Initial report on a suspected Chinese spy balloon drifting towards the U.S. air space wasn't originally marked as urgent. The new discovery has drawn ire from Republican lawmakers already unhappy with how long it took for the U.S. president's order to shoot it down. Here is what the Pentagon had to say about the incident.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRIG. GEN. PATRICK RYDER, PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: I can assure you this was not for civilian purposes. That is -- we are 100 percent clear about that. Based on what we know and have serve observed about this balloon, it is a surveillance balloon, it was an intelligent collection capability.

You know, a question I would ask myself is if in fact it was a civilian balloon, a weather balloon and it was approaching a sovereign nation about to enter their air space, a responsible nation would have put out some kind of public statement saying hey, head's up, this is heading your way, just want to let you know. The PRC did not to that. They didn't respond until after they were called out. We'll just leave it at that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NOBILO: The incident has prompted NATO to acknowledge that there's been an increase in Chinese surveillance activities around the globe. On Wednesday, the director general met with the U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken who says that China's actions are a clear violation of international law.

FOSTER: Now Japan is investigating whether a similar object seen in their air space over the past two years were of Chinese origin as well.

NOBILO: CNN's Kristie Lu Stout joins us now from Hong Kong with more. Kristie, one of the elements of this that confuses me slightly, is that's simultaneously we're having reports of the fact that possibly many of these surveillance balloons could have been missed by countries around the world. But also that China may have intended to send a message to the United States with this airship or this surveillance balloon to indicate that they are not going to shy away from competition. What is your assessment?

KRISTI LU STOUT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, in China the ministry of foreign affairs briefing earlier today did address that and all the assertions that you just laid out from the U.S. State Department as well as the Pentagon. They also addressed the interview that the U.S. President Joe Biden gave to PBS News Hour in which he said that the U.S. shooting down the Chinese balloon did not make U.S./China relations worse.

And I'll tell you this, a number of China watchers dispute that. They say that U.S./China relations under strain right now. And they really don't see a window of opportunity opening up near term for a reset. Earlier today at the ministry of foreign affairs briefing, we heard the spokeswoman again insist that this Chinese balloon was a civilian aircraft that blew off course. The United States of course disputes that saying that this is spy crafts and not only that, part of a wider Chinese military surveillance operation that spans multiple continents. With the Pentagon saying that they have 100 percent certainty this was not just a weather balloon.

I want to show you this statement we received from the ministry of foreign affairs just a couple hours ago in response to what we've been hearing from the U.S. overnight.

According to the spokeswoman, Mao Ning, she said: The U.S. side claims that this balloon is part of a fleet of aircraft, -- I do not know that. I think that this may be part of the U.S. side of the information and public opinion warfare against China. The international community can see clearly who is the world's largest spy surveillance monitoring country. Unquote.

A rather bold and -- and let me underscore -- unsubstantiated claim from Beijing there. Back to you -- Bianca and Max.

NOBILO: Kristie Lu Stout in Hong Kong, thank you.

I me, it's difficult for these events not to inflame tensions especially when we're getting reports that Washington has briefed about 40 allied nations about China's potential surveillance programs. It does ratchets up the rhetoric.

FOSTER: Absolutely, and I mean, it was when that meeting came about, wasn't it, this this massive briefing. You know, it's been happening to you as well. But we haven't had much information about that briefing. But certainly, the allies as it were, are really sort of on alert about these balloons.

The U.S. House of Representatives is scheduled to be briefed on China today and the House Speaker says it is OK with a controversial Congressman attending the classified briefing despite being caught in a web of lies actually. George Santos has been busy defending himself after an exchange with Republican Senator Mitt Romney in the lower part of the screen who told him he didn't belong in Congress. That tense encounter went down right before the "State of the Union."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REP. GEORGE SANTOS (R-NY): It's not the first time in history that I've been told to shut up and go to the back of the room especially by people who come from a privileged background. And's not going to be the last. And I'm never going to shut up and go to the back of the room and I think it is reprehensible that the Senator would say such a thing to me in a demeaning way. He said, it wasn't very Mormon of him. That's what I can tell you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[04:40:00]

FOSTER: There you go, that told him. Santos is facing growing calls to resign over his many lies. And on Wednesday, one fellow Republican even called him a sociopath. CNN's Eva McKend picks up the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PROTESTERS: New York 3, Santos free.

EVA MCKEND, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER (voice-over): The spate of lies from freshman Congressman George Santos have done more than anger his constituents. It's also raising serious questions about why Santos constantly lies.

CHRISTIAN HART, PSYCHOLOGIST, PROFESSOR, TEXAS WOMAN'S UNIVERSITY: When we're talking about pathological lying, we have a clear-cut example in the headlines every day.

MCKEND (voice-over): Christian Hart is a psychologist who directs the human deception laboratory at Texas Woman's University.

MCKEND: What is a pathological liar?

HART: Someone who has a maladaptive pattern of lying. The person seems to lie excessively, so there prolifically lying, telling the lies. Typically cause a lot of problems in their life, problems with relationships, problems in the workplace, sometimes legal problems.

MCKEND (voice-over): Among Santos' lies that have been exposed in the months following his election include --

SANTOS: I actually went to school on a volleyball scholarship.

SANTOS: My mom was a 9/11 survivor.

SANTOS: I'm a Latino Jew.

SANTOS: My grandparents survived the Holocaust.

SANTOS: I also founded my own nonprofit organization.

MCKEND (voice-over): While it's still unclear what is motivating Santos' lies, psychologists like Hart say there's always a reason.

HART: People don't lie at random. They believe there won't be repercussions for their lying. And then also they can somehow morally justify they're lying or prove to themselves that they're still an OK person.

SANTOS: I've lived an honest life. I've never been accused of any bad doing.

MCKEND (voice-over): Without meeting Santos, he can't diagnose him, but says his pervasive lying does say something about him.

HART: When we see people telling egregious lies like that, and there appears to be a lifelong pattern associated with it, I would say certainly he seems to be the type of person who's engaging in pathological lying.

MCKEND: There was this moment at the State of the Union Address where Senator Romney approached him, and he didn't seem apologetic at all.

HART: We see this pattern a lot, and people with psychopathic tendencies, or people with antisocial personality disorders -- and in those cases what we find is that those people are extremely comfortable manipulating and using and exploiting people, and they do so with very little guilt or shame, and tend not to have remorse.

MCKEND (voice-over): And Hart says that for those that are pathological liars, it's not so easy to detect.

HART: They seem to be making a completely truthful and compelling case. It's only when we look for the evidence that we see that that was a lie.

MCKEND (voice-over): Eva McKend, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

NOBILO: A rain jacket is the focus of a double murder trial in South Carolina. Still ahead, how prosecutors are trying to collect gun residue found on the piece of clothing to Alex Murdaugh.

FOSTER: Plus, an arrest in the case of missing squirrel monkeys in Louisiana. But here why the zoo they were stolen from isn't breathing a sigh of relief quite yet.

[04:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FOSTER: Police in southern Louisiana have arrested a man they say stole 12 squirrel monkeys from a zoo. He is accused of taking the small primates from a facility known as --

NOBILO: Zoosiana, like Louisiana.

FOSTER: Zoosiana, yes -- during a break in last month. While authorities think that they found the culprit, the monkeys still remain missing. Anyone with any information about their possible whereabouts is being urged to contact the police. The 61-year-old suspect faces charges of animal cruelty and burglary.

NOBILO: An FBI electronics expert will return to the witness stand today in the double murder trial of Alex Murdaugh in South Carolina. The expert will testify about Murdaugh's possible movements at the time that his wife and son were killed in 2021. The testimony comes after prosecutors focused on the gunshot residue particles found on Murdaugh's clothes. CNN's Randi Kaye has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MEGAN FLETCHER, SLED GUNSHOT RESIDUE EXPERT: This jacket is the jacket I examined.

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): She's talking about the rain jacket that was discovered stashed in an upstairs closet at Alex Murdaugh's mother's home. It was found months after the murders of his wife Maggie Murdaugh and their son Paul. Meghan Fletcher a gunshot residue expert for the state told the court she found a significant amount of gunshot residue particles on the inside of that jacket.

FLETCHER: I confirmed 38 particles characteristic. Given that it's on the inside, in order for it to be consistent with transfer, an object or objects with a high amount of gunshot primary residue on it would have had to transfer to it.

KAYE (voice-over): An object like a firearm, as prosecutor John Meadors hinted at with this line of questioning.

JOHN MEADORS, PROSECUTOR: And he had a gun inside that rain jacket that had recently been fired and you were taking it somewhere to hide it or transport it with the 38 particles inside, inside the rain jacket be consistent with transfer from a recently fired firearm?

FLETCHER: That is a possibility, yes, sir.

KAYE (voice-over): In his opening statement lead prosecutor Creighton Waters promised the jury this evidence was coming. The state's working theory seems to be that be Alex Murdaugh used this rain jacket to wrap up at least one of the murder weapons and after allegedly disposing of them, he stashed this raincoat in his mother's House. A theory the defense tried to knock down.

JIM GRIFFIN, ALEX MURDAUGH'S DEFENSE ATTORNEY: There's no way for you to know when the gunshot primer residue was deposited on the blue rain jacket?

FLETCHER: That's correct.

GRIFFIN: You have no idea how the gunshot primary residue ended up on that garment correct?

FLETCHER: I cannot tell you how it got there.

GRIFFIN: OK. Or when it got there.

FLETCHER: Or when it got there. KAYE (voice-over): Alex Murdaugh's former paralegal also testified.

She told the jury about how he allegedly stole from his former law firm. She also identified his voice on a recording taken by Paul Murdaugh on his phone. Prosecutors believe the video was recorded gist a few minutes before Maggie and Paul Murdaugh were killed. When Alex Murdaugh said he wasn't at his family at the dog kennels on the property.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hey, he's got birds in his mouth.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, Bubba.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you recognize any voices in the video?

ANNETTE GRISWOLD, FORMER PARALEGAL FOR ALEX MURDAUGH: I do. I hear three voices.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And tell me who you hear.

GRISWOLD: I hear Paul Murdaugh, Maggie Murdaugh and Alex Murdaugh.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And how sure are you?

GRISWOLD: I'm 100 percent sure.

KAYE (voice-over): Randi Kaye, CNN, Walterboro, South Carolina.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOSTER: Still to come, Disney announces sweeping new changes to cut costs across the company. How the organization plans to save more than $5 billion, when we return.

[04:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

NOBILO: Disney CEO Bob Iger has announced a new plan to cut $5.5 billion in expenses across the company and streamline its operations in the coming years. That includes cutting about 7,000 jobs roughly 3 percent of Disney's entire global staff.

FOSTER: All of Disney's media content will now be housed under one umbrella dubbed Disney Entertainment. Iger also announced a drive to make the company streaming service profitable by next year after losing a large amount of subscribers last year.

House of Mouse is going back to some of its biggest money makers in the future while detailing the company's restructuring. CEO Bob Iger also announce new movies in development.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The wind is falling like this swirling storm inside.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NOBILO: Disney isn't ready to let go of Frozen yet with a third film in the works after a 2019 sequel. And a fifth Toy Story film is also on the docket. Most recently both franchises pulled in more than $1 billion in the global box office.

[04:55:00]

FOSTER: U.S. football player Damar Hamlin is this year's winner of the NFL players association community award which recognizes an athlete's positive impact on his community. The Buffalo Bills safety received the most votes from other players in the league. And it comes a month after he went into cardiac arrest during a game and was rushed from the field to the hospital on live TV. The Bills say his toy drives foundation subsequently raised almost $9 million in donations. Hamlin didn't talk about his future in football though, but the medical director of the NFL players union predicts and say, quote, guarantee Hamlin will play pro football once again, which is great news.

NOBILO: Brilliant. And one of the biggest players in the NBA is on the move. ESPN and athletic report that the Brooklyn Nets have traded Kevin Durant to the Phoenix Suns for three players and at least for draft picks.

FOSTER: Durant was the league's MVP in the 2013-2014 season. He's currently sidelined though with a ligament sprain. Meanwhile, his former Nets teammate Kyrie Irving made his debut with the Dallas Mavericks last night. Irving scored 24 points to lead the Mavericks to a 110-104 victory over the LA Clippers.

NOBILO: And thank you for joining us on CNN NEWSROOM.

FOSTER: I'm Max Foster. "EARLY START" is next, isn't it, with Christine. I'm trying to remember who is doing it.

NOBILO: Tune in, it will be fantastic.

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