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CNN International: Nikki Haley Calls for New Generation of Leadership; Jurors See Footage of Murdaugh Interview with Investigator; Inside the Mission to Deliver Aid to Quake Survivors in Turkey and Syria; Indian Income Tax Authorities Search BBC Offices. Aired 4:30-5a ET
Aired February 16, 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]
BIANCA NOBILO, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Bianca Nobilo.
MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Max Foster. If you are just joining us, let me bring you up to date with our top stories.
In a few hours, the chief of the Environmental Protection Agency is set to arrive in East Palestine, Ohio to assess the damage left by a train derailment that emitted toxic chemicals into the area. New documents show the rail line Norfolk Southern hasn't removed toxic soil from the site.
And the special counsel investigating the January 6 Capitol attack has subpoenaed Donald Trump's former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows for more information into the riots and possibly Trump's handling of classified documents as well.
NOBILO: Nikki Haley is hitting the campaign trail one day after officially declaring her bid for the White House. The former Republican governor of South Carolina says it's time to move beyond the stale ideas and faded names of the fast and elect a new generation of leadership. The 51-year-old daughter of Indian immigrants says that she wants America to be strong and proud, not weak and woke.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NIKKI HALEY, U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: America is not past our prime, it's just that our politicians are past theirs.
In the America, I see the permanent politician will finally retire. We'll have term limits for Congress. And mandatory mental competency tests for politicians over 75 years old.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NOBILO: Haley served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under Donald Trump. Her support for him has gone back and forth over the past few years. The former president says that Haley should follow her heart and he wishes her luck. FOSTER: As U.S. President Joe Biden edges closer to an expected
reelection bid, he is taking sharp aim at the Republicans proposed economic agenda. Speaking to union workers in Maryland on Wednesday, he warned that Republicans have proposed have proposed massive win falls for large corporations, pharmaceutical giants and the very wealthy yet refuse to raise the nation's debt limit unless their demands are met for spending cuts. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The truth of the matter is you made a lot of this progress with Republican help. Sometimes we had to go it alone, but a lot of the progress we've made so far is because we worked together. Sadly from what I'm hearing from the new leader of the House of Representatives -- in the new House of Representatives -- they are suggesting this cooperation has come to an end.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NOBILO: But neither side is prepared to back down on the debt limit in the near term. But unless Congress takes action in the coming weeks, the consequences for the U.S. and global economies could be severe. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the U.S. Treasury can keep paying the bills for now using its so-called extraordinary measures. But it warns that the risk of government default will become critical in a few months possibly as early as July and almost certainly by September.
FOSTER: Whatever their concerns about inflation, American consumers were in a buoyant spending mood last month. The Census Bureau reports that retail sales in January surged 3 percent -- the biggest monthly jump in two years. While it does help ease recession concerns, it also is a reminder that inflation has not been tamed.
Department stores were the biggest beneficiaries of the post holiday spending spree. Up more than 17 percent. Bars, restaurants and auto dealers also saw significant upticks in sales.
NOBILO: The prosecution is closer to finishing their case in the double murder trial of disgraced former South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh. He is accused of killing his wife and son in an alleged attempt to cover up financial crimes.
On Wednesday jurors saw footage from a critical interview with Murdaugh. CNN's Randi Kaye has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID OWEN, SPECIAL LEAD INVESTIGATOR, SOUTHERN CAROLINA LAW ENFORCEMENT DIVISION: Did you kill Maggie?
ALEX MURDAUGH, ACCUSED OF MURDERING WIFE AND SON: No.
[04:35:00]
OWEN: Did you kill Paul? MURDAUGH: No, I did not kill Paul.
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is the first time we hear lead investigator David Owen ask Alex Murdaugh directly if he killed his wife Maggie Murdaugh and their son Paul.
OWEN: Do you know who did it?
MURDAUGH: No sir, I do not know who did it.
KAYE (voice-over): Special Agent Owen had a lot more questions for Murdaugh too, including why he was wearing something different after the murders than he was earlier in the night on this Snapchat video pulled from his son's phone.
OWEN: At what point in that evening did you change clothes?
MURDAUGH: I'm not sure. You know, it would've been, I guess that changed when I got back to the house.
KAYE (voice-over): The prosecution has suggested that Murdaugh showered and changed his clothes following the murders. The defense pushed back on that.
JIM GRIFFIN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY IN THE MURDAUGH MURDER CASE: Wouldn't you expect to find some trace evidence of blood somewhere in the house?
OWEN: There was no trace evidence of blood found in the house, no.
GRIFFIN: Thank you.
KAYE (voice-over): Alex Murdaugh has told investigators several times that on the night of the murders, he had dinner with his family, then took a nap and later drove to his mother's house.
OWEN: How long would you say you were at your mom's that night?
MURDAUGH: 45 minutes, an hour.
KAYE (voice-over): 45 minutes to an hour? Remember, his mother's caretaker testified Murdaugh came by the house for just 15 to 20 minutes that night. At least four times during this interview, Owen asked Murdaugh if he was at the kennels where the murders took place earlier that night, before he says he found his family dead. Each time, Murdaugh denied being there.
OWEN: And you didn't go back down there after dinner until after visiting your mother?
MURDAUGH: Yes, sir.
KAYE (voice-over): Owen also asked Murdaugh if it was his voice on a video investigators extracted from Paul Murdaugh's phone. It had been recorded at the murder scene at 8:44 p.m., just a few minutes before Paul and Maggie were killed. OWEN: And that was prior to the murder (ph). Was it you?
MURDAUGH: No sir. Not if my times were right.
KAYE (voice-over): At least eight witnesses have testified that it's Alex Murdaugh's voice on that recording. Murdaugh also had some questions for Owen during the interview.
MURDAUGH: Can you tell me for sure, the gun, did you (INAUDIBLE) shot first the gun -- is this one person, two persons, three persons?
JUDGE CLIFTON NEWMAN, SOUTH CAROLINA CIRCUIT COURT: Is that the first time he's ever asked you that?
OWEN: Yes, sir.
NEWMAN: Ever?
OWEN: That I recall, yes.
NEWMAN: In the whole investigation to this point?
OWEN: Yes, sir.
KAYE (voice-over): And just before the interview ended, Owen made it clear to Murdaugh that investigators are focused on him and only him.
MURDAUGH: Do you think I killed Maggie?
OWEN: I have to go with the evidence and the facts.
MURDAUGH: I understand that. And do you think I killed Paul?
OWEN: I have to go where the evidence and the facts given me at the end. I don't have anything that points to anybody else at this time.
KAYE (voice-over): Randi Kaye, CNN, Walterboro, South Carolina.
NOBILO: Turning now to some health news. Moderna says its COVID vaccine will remain available for free even when the government stops paying for it in May. The "Wall Street Journal" reported in January that Moderna was considering charging up to $130 per vaccine dose when the U.S. Public Health Emergency Declaration ends. But the company made the new announcement on Wednesday the same day that Senator Bernie Sanders called its CEO to testify about the reported price hike.
FOSTER: And medication touted as a lifesaver for opioid overdoses could become available over the counter in the U.S. On Wednesday two FDA advisory groups gave the green light to a nasal spray version of the drug caused Narcan. The agency's commissioner has yet to give the final approval. The move could save the lives of overdose victims when professional medical help isn't available.
NOBILO: Still ahead, CNN's chief's chief medical correspondent follows the mission to help earthquake survivors. We'll visit an airfield where humanitarian aid can't go out quickly enough.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: And really, just as far as the eye can see, there's all sorts of supplies that are now trying to get from this air strip to the people who desperately need them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[04:40:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: Humanitarian aid is slowly arriving in Turkey and Syria following last week's devastating earthquake. The challenge now is getting the aid to survivors across the region where roads, rail and airports have been very badly damaged.
NOBILO: CNN's chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta follows relief workers trying to reach those survivors in Turkey.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The skies over Turkey are continuously pierced with the sound of helicopter blades. Still performing crucial search and rescue, but also delivering people and goods to places hard to access, and now near isolated from the rest of the world, like Antakya in Hatay Province.
Look what the earthquake did in just minutes here. So many buildings razed to the ground. More than eight days later, too many people still going without even basic supplies.
GUPTA: Donations continue to pour in from all over the world. To give you an idea, they have things like baby formula, these are safety hard hats over here. These are the types of things that are coming in. Over here, you have bread. So, they have all sorts of dry foods that are coming in.
These are donations that are coming from individuals, things like blankets and warm clothes. And really, just as far as the eye can see, there's all sorts of supplies that are now trying to get from this air strip to the people who desperately need them.
GUPTA (voice-over): Over and over again, spontaneous supply lines like this one form, and within minutes, dozens and dozens of tents are loaded onto the helicopter.
Today's mission to provide cover and protection in Hatay, a province that has lost both. From the sky, it is easy to see why they are so necessary.
A group of men can be seen waiting earnestly for their temporary new homes. They quickly unload the helicopter, struggling against the whirr of the blades, which never stop.
GUPTA: So they've just unloaded the tents here in Hatay. This is one of the hardest-hit areas of the quake zone.
GUPTA (voice-over): Off in the distance, a floating hospital, a near necessity after natural disasters like this. After all, as with most other buildings, the hospitals often don't survive either.
[04:45:00]
These hospital ships provide immediate beds and operating rooms like this one, where 37-year-old Mehmet received an operation on his leg after falling two stories during the earthquake.
Even a maternity ward, yes, tragically, more than 40,000 people have died, but there has also been new life here -- a beautiful baby girl.
Another benefit, the captain tells me, unlike the field hospitals on firm ground, these hospital ships in the water are relatively protected from the numerous aftershocks that continuously devastated the land.
For now, the ground is quiet, but the skies are loud and that is good. As this part of the slowly, surely, finds its footing.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Earlier the death toll from the disaster jumped to more than 42,000.
NOBILO: And just moments ago we've learned that a teenager was rescued 248 hours after the quake. Let's get right to CNN's Nada Bashir who's live in Istanbul. Nada, we are still getting these miraculous stories of survival but the emphasis is obviously shifting to those who are now left without homes and people who need aid and support. What can you tell us about the efforts being made to prevent send secondary humanitarian disaster?
NADA BASHIR, CNN REPORTER: That is really the concern now, Bianca and Max. Of course the situation in southeast Turkey is hugely difficult to say the least. It is freezing cold temperatures, people left homeless -- thousands left homeless. And as you could imagine, the humanitarian situation on the ground is a cause for great concern.
And we have seen those aid efforts now being funneled into the region. From here in Istanbul, there has been a huge outpouring of support from locals, from the government. We've seen donations piling into the city being sent onwards to southeast Turkey. We've seen ships being transformed into mobile clinics to care for those who have been injured and wounded in the aftermath of the earthquake in southeast Turkey. The that aid being transferred day in and day out for more than a week.
Now here in Istanbul, there are thousands of volunteers working around the clock to offer that support. And as you mentioned there, those search and rescue efforts are still very much ongoing despite the fact that the window for finding survivors is closing very, very quickly. But we are still hearing these remarkable stories of people being pulled alive from the rubble more than 200 hours after the earthquake struck.
Of course as you mentioned, just in the last hour or so, a 17-year-old girl pulled out in Kahramanmaras after being buried beneath the rubble for 248 hours. Just overnight another teenage boy also pulled out in Antakya. So there is still a sense of hope that there could be survivors beneath the rubble and the search and rescue effort is continuing. But as you can imagine for the thousands of people waiting for news of their loved ones, waiting and hoping that they are still alive, is this a hugely difficult time.
NOBILO: Nada Bashir live in Istanbul, thank you for all of your reporting.
FOSTER: Antarctica's doomsday glacier could collapse in just a few years. And now scientists have a better idea of why. On top of the Glaser melting news studies show an ice shelf blocking the glacier from crashing into the sea is also rapidly melting. Deep cracks in the ice are expanding because of warming ocean waters making it weaker and more vulnerable to shattering.
The glacier is roughly the size of the U.S. state of Florida, it is called "doomsday glacier" because scientists say that a full collapse would be a disaster raising the global sea level by more than 10 feet.
FOSTER: Still ahead, Indian tax authorities search the offices of a media giant in Mumbai and New Delhi. Critics are calling it a vendetta. We are live in the Indian capital to get details.
[04:50:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris just arriving there in Germany for the Munich Security Conference. Russia's invasion of Ukraine obviously expected to be the main focus there. All the key figures really from governments and intelligence services and militaries around the world regularly go there, so it's a big moment. The group released its annual report this week calling the war the most brazen attack on the world's rules based order. The conference scheduled to start on Friday.
NOBILO: Actress Raquel Welch who raised to fame in the movie "Fantastic Voyage" and became a sex symbol of the 1960s and beyond has died.
FOSTER: Her career spanned more than five decades with than 70 film and television credits to her name.
NOBILO: But it was her role in the adventure movie "One Million BC" and the films marketing images of her in a fur bikini that turned her into an international sex symbol. She went on to win a Golden Globe for her performance in the 1973 film version of the "Three Musketeers." FOSTER: Raquel Welch was 82.
Journalists and rights groups are condemning searches by tax authorities on the BBC offices in India. They come nearly a month after the network aired a documentary critical of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
NOBILO: The Press Club of India calls the raid a vendetta. But a government adviser says that the BBC has not provided convincing responses to previous tax notices.
FOSTER: Let's go to Delhi and CNN's Vedika Sud. It is hugely controversial this search, but can we tie it directly to the ban on that documentary?
VEDIKA SUD, CNN REPORTER: Well, absolutely very controversial, Max, but the timing is suspect, isn't it. Because it was just last month that that documentary that you are talking about was released. It was banned in India. The Modi government used emergency laws to make sure that access to that documentary was blocked in the country. They called it a propaganda piece by the BBC.
However, the BBC had responded back then saying, we've done thorough research on this.
[04:55:00]
What's interesting is day three of the survey -- and I use the word survey because that's the word the Indian government is using instead of a raid by the Indian tax authorities in two offices of the BBC here in India in Mumbai and in New Delhi. It's day three -- that's what we know from two sources who have knowledge of this, but did not want to be named.
We've also heard from a spokesperson of the income tax department yesterday who says, yes, the survey is still on, we haven't heard otherwise. We are presuming as of now that it continues.
But the larger discourse at this point, Max and Bianca, is the threat to the democracy of the country -- that's what critics are saying. Like you said, the critics who are shamming this move as vendetta politics, some are calling it vindictive.
So, yes, this this comes just weeks after the release of the documentary and that's the reason why you have the main opposition party in India challenging what the Modi government is doing here. They have criticized it. So, we have a lot of, you know, of these watch groups across the globe including free press freedom advocates here in India.
For now, we haven't heard interestingly from the U.K. Prime Minister on this huge controversy back in India. He hasn't said a word on it. We haven't heard from the income tax department. We've been told by the government once they are done with the survey is when they're going to speak. We're waiting for that to happen. Also, since yesterday there hasn't been any press release from the BBC on the survey that's being conducted in India. Back to you -- Max and Bianca.
FOSTER: Vedika thank you very much indeed. And a lot of Indian journalists have complained about these sorts of searches previously but now it feels next level because the BBC is now experiencing it as an international problem.
NOBILO: Exactly.
FOSTER: U.S. fast food chain Chick-fil-A is giving back to delivery workers in New York. Starting today they are running a store front on the upper east side called "The Brake Room," a place for those workers to literally take a break, charge their phones or grab a cup of coffee.
NOBILO: Chick-fil-A say the delivery community has become increasingly important to restaurants since the start of the pandemic. New York's mayor also announced the city will turn vacant spaces into rest areas for the city 65,000 delivery workers.
FOSTER: Thank you for joining us here on CNN newsroom. I'm Max Foster.
NOBILO: I'm Bianca Nobilo. We'll see you tomorrow.
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