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Gun Violence Mars Holiday Weekend Across U.S.; PA State Trooper Killed In Shootout; Blinken Holds High-Stakes Talks In Beijing; Heaviest Fighting In Northeast, South Regions; Black Reparations; Hot Stock Market Summer. Aired 7-8p ET

Aired June 18, 2023 - 19:00   ET

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

JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jim Acosta in Washington, good evening. Another holiday weekend in America marred by gun violence from coast to coast. Take a look at this map marking random and mass acts of gun violence that have taken at least five lives and left dozens more injured and traumatized in the long holiday weekend is far from over and the Chicago suburb of Willowbrook. A Juneteenth celebration last night ended with one person dead and at least 22 others injured, some by gunfire. CNN's Camila Bernal has been following this story for us. Camilla, what can you tell us?

CAMILA BERNAL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Jim. So authorities saying that they're still trying to talk to witnesses and victims, trying to figure out exactly what happened. They say there is no suspect or suspects in custody and they don't have a motive. They don't understand why this happened just yet. But they are giving us a timeline of how it happened yesterday, because what they're saying is that this Juneteenth event began at around 06:00 p.m.

And there were officers there, there were law enforcement that were there for the event. But at 12:25 in the morning, they received a 911 call. And this call reported a fight nearby. And so some of the law enforcement officers went over to see what was going on with this fight.

As they're trying to respond to this 911 call, they then realize and hear the shots. And so they go back to this event. And it is, of course, chaos. Unfortunately, we already know one person died, 22 others injured. The injuries ranging from minor injuries to, last we heard, two in critical condition. We haven't gotten an update as to how these victims are doing at the moment, but it was traumatizing for a lot of the people that were there. Take a listen to two witnesses.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CRAIG LOTTIE, WITNESS: We were all just out and next thing, you know, shots just got, going off and everybody ran. And, yeah, it was chaos.

MARKESHIA AVERY, WITNESS: I've never been at anything like this, honestly. I just -- honestly have a headache from the whole commotion. All I could do is check on my friends and want to see if everything was OK.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BERNAL: And some people went to the hospital on their own. We know there were twelve ambulances at the scene. They had, of course, the opportunity to transport a lot of these victims to the hospital. And again, authorities at the moment just trying to figure out exactly what happened and what the motive was behind this shooting, because this was supposed to be a celebration. Unfortunately, this now joins the list of now 310 mass shootings in the U.S. according to the Gun Violence Archive. Jim?

ACOSTA: And it's only June. All right, Camila Bernal, thank you very much.

We should note the White House is commenting on the mass shooting in Illinois. The White House Press Secretary tweeted the President and First Lady are thinking of those killed and injured in the shooting in Illinois last night. We've reached out to offer assistance the state and local leaders in the wake of this tragedy at a community Juneteenth celebration.

Now, in Missouri, where police say 10 teenagers were shot in downtown St. Louis overnight, ranging in ages from 15 to 19 years old. A 17- year-old died from his injuries. Another teen is critically injured after being trampled as people rush to get away. Police say they recovered several weapons, including an AR-15 style weapon, and they have a 17-year-old suspect in custody. Earlier tonight, I spoke with St. Louis's mayor about all of this. She's frustrated by her state's failure to pass meaningful gun reform.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR TISHAURA JONES, (D) ST. LOUIS: It's tragic, especially the proliferation of guns in our country. How our children now have access to guns and are using them on each other. This is unacceptable.

In Missouri, we don't have any laws when it comes to guns, not even common-sense gun safety laws. And the Missouri legislature has preempted cities from enacting common sense gun safety laws on a local level, which we all know poll very well about red flag laws and universal background checks. All of those, and especially the bill that they didn't take any action on this year would have kept guns out of the hands of minors.

ACOSTA: And joining us now is Chief Charles Ramsey, CNN Senior Law Enforcement Analyst and a former Police Chief in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. Chief, thanks for being with us. I wish we could say this is an unusually violent weekend, but more and more it seems like the status quo for too many cities.

Let's start with the situation outside of Chicago. A Juneteenth celebration turning into a fight, turning into a deadly shooting. Apparently the police had been there earlier in the evening, but left. What your response to that? And I guess what is going on in this country? It seems like we're just talking about this far too much?

CHARLES RAMSEY, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, we are talking about it far too much. And it's not just weekends. It's every day of the week that we have something like this occur. It may not be classified as a mass shooting, but there are homicides taking place on the streets of our cities every single day, and guns are largely responsible for that.

[19:05:15]

Well, guns and the idiots that use guns to commit crime. So it's not unusual. It's a shame. You can't even have a celebration or a gathering without the fear of it turning into a mass shooting of some kind.

Apparently they did have officers assigned there, but some call was made, probably to take them away, to distract them to go somewhere else so they could commit whatever the crime that they ultimately committed. But it's just one more and more to come.

ACOSTA: Absolutely more to come. There's no question about that. And then the shooting last night in downtown St. Louis. Police say 10 teenagers were shot. It's just hard to hear the words coming out of my mouth. This just happened so much. The victims, ranging from 15 to 19 years old, one 17-year-old died from his injuries. You heard what the St. Louis Mayor had to say. The Missouri legislature won't pass meaningful gun reform. And it sounds like a lot of these mayors and a lot of these big cities are kind of at the mercy of state lawmakers that are sitting on their hands and not really doing anything to solve this problem?

RAMSEY: Yeah, many are. I mean, I've worked with the U.S. Conference of Mayors. Mayors are very, very frustrated. Certainly, more could be done locally at the state level, but something has to be done nationally, because, you know, part of the problem, if people just simply leave the jurisdiction that has tougher gun laws and go somewhere that it's more lax and purchase the guns and so it's complicated. It's going to really take effort on all levels in order to really put together any kind of meaningful legislation that can begin to even try to curb some of the gun violence that we see out on the streets.

And it is absolutely a national crisis. Let me ask you about a very different scenario in Pennsylvania. A man firing on squad cars at a state police outpost and then getting into a shootout with state troopers. It sounds like it was a gunfight. One trooper was killed. Another is fighting for his life. One official saying it was one of the most intense and unbelievable gunfights he'd witnessed in his career. And we we've just gotten some sound in to CNN from this shootout. Let's listen to it, and I'll get your reaction after that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just be an officer involved shooting. You have an officer down, heavy police presence in the area, shot in the shoulder, shallow breathing, possibly a high-powered rifle.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: You know, sometimes we forget, Chief, that first responders are caught up in this, too. They're not just responding to the scenes of these mass shootings. They're caught up in these acts of violence as well. And a gunfight, the way it's been described, it just sounds like it was just a horrific situation?

RAMSEY: Well, I mean, you got a 29-year-old trooper now that's dead. A 45-year-old lieutenant who's shot and fighting for his life. Right now, the suspect is dead. I don't believe they have a motive yet, but they'll certainly be trying to figure out what actually prompted him to do this.

But it sounds to me like there was a little bit of suicide by cop involved in this, too, because there's no way he could possibly think that he could attack police like that and not ultimately wind up killed.

And so, again, it's just the kind of violence that takes place. Unfortunately, sometimes police are the targets. Other times, it's just ordinary citizens. But I've seen it time and time again in my career, not necessarily attacks on a police station, but I've buried a lot of police officers in my time, and it is incredibly tragic.

And something that really people need to really think about the families that they leave behind, because that's the --

ACOSTA: Yeah.

RAMSEY: I mean, that is a true tragedy in and of itself.

ACOSTA: So many lives shattered by these acts of mass gun violence in this country. Our condolences go to that trooper's family as well.

Chief Charles Ramsey I wish we didn't talk about this subject so much. I suspect we'll be talking about it again soon. Thanks very much for your time. We appreciate it.

RAMSEY: Thank you, Jim.

ACOSTA: All right, let's go now to China, where Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with his Chinese counterpart in Beijing today as part of a mission to steer the U.S.-China relationship back on course. The high stakes meeting comes as we're seeing a historic spike in tensions. China's Foreign Minister told Blinken that relations are at their lowest point since the two countries establish his formal ties in 1979.

And CNN's Kylie Atwood joins us now from Beijing. That's a pretty tough talk coming from the Chinese Foreign Minister. What can the Secretary of State do to turn this around? I guess just getting a dialogue going is something.

[19:10:05]

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, when we talk to Senior State Department officials after the first round of meetings here, what they said was that the meetings were direct, that both of the sides expressed a willingness to engage in conversations that would drive down tensions, and there were agreements on a number of fronts.

Now, the Senior State Department officials noted that they are in the middle of this two-day visit here to Beijing, so they didn't get into any specifics in terms of agreements, whether on military-to-military channels, we know that the Biden administration wants to stand up regular military to military channels of communication with China, whether it's the issue of fentanyl, Jim. Of course, you know, the opioid crisis in the United States is a major killer of Americans, and a lot of the precursor chemicals for fentanyl come from China, whether it's the Americans who are wrongfully detained here, whether it's Taiwan.

But on the issue of Taiwan specifically, that Chinese Foreign Ministry readout also made it clear that that was an issue that appeared to be quite sticky in the meeting yesterday, saying that Foreign Minister Qin Gang made it clear that there were demands from China on Taiwan that that is the most pronounced risk to the U.S.-China relationship, and made it clear that China does not want the United States to support Taiwan's independence.

Now, of course, the United States doesn't officially support Taiwan's independence. They support the One China policy strategic ambiguity when it comes to Taiwan. But President Biden has made comments supportive of Taiwan in the past that have concerned officials here in Beijing and, of course, those arm sales to Taiwan that the United States continued to advance with.

Now, in terms of where this conversation goes, on its second day, China's Foreign Ministry also said that they accepted an offer from the Secretary of State for Xinjiang to visit Washington. So that indicates that even after today here in Beijing, there's going to be continued meetings between Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his Chinese counterpart. That is hopeful in the eyes of U.S. officials. But really what we're looking for today when the Secretary holds a press conference later in the day, is the substance. Did they actually get ahead in any of these issues that are really, really, really critical to the tension between the two countries right now. Jim?

ACOSTA: All right, Kylie Atwood reporting from Beijing. I know you'll be busy. Thanks so much. Appreciate it.

Coming up, why haven't more Republicans criticized Donald Trump for his alleged mishandling of classified documents, including his Republican presidential opponents? Our political panel weighs in, just ahead.

Plus, Ukraine says it's gaining ground in its battle against Russia. We'll look at what that means for the war over there.

And later, the new effort to use hallucinogenic magic mushrooms as therapy. We'll talk with someone who's tried it. One of our very own CNN Correspondent David Culver. That's coming up. You're live in the CNN Newsroom.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:17:11]

ACOSTA: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the toughest fighting is to taking place on Ukraine's southern front. He says his troops there are gaining ground. Today Ukraine's air force claims to have hit a Russian ammunition depot in the occupied Kherson region. It's just one of several targets Ukraine's military claims to have hit over the past 24 hours.

Also, in the southern part of the country, a Russian-backed, official says, a Russian occupied village near Zaporizhzhia has fallen. Russia for its part denies that report. And it's not just assaults inside Ukrainian borders. The Governor of Russia's Kursk region says villages near the border endured more than two dozen strikes. He says they damaged several buildings, including a sugar factory and knocked out power lines.

Mason Clark joins us now. He's the Lead Russia Analyst for the Institute for the Study of War. Mason, a lot happening on multiple fronts. Walk us through what you're seeing?

MASON CLARK, LEAD RUSSIA ANALYST, INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF WAR: Absolutely. So Ukrainian forces are still in the preparatory stages of their much anticipated and long prepared for counter offensive. They're largely attacking at four different points along the line, around Bakhmut in northeastern Ukraine, around Donetsk City in southeastern Ukraine, and then in two areas in Zaporizhzhia Oblast, one on the border between Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk Oblast and then in the west near the city or south of the city of Orikhiv, which is where many of their attacks have been.

As has been noted, they've been making some progress but they are running into quite well prepared Russian defensive positions and we're seeing a number of pauses by Ukrainian forces as they reevaluate their tactics. And we're likely a ways away from the main Ukrainian effort of their 12 or so counter offensive brigades being committed to major operations.

ACOSTA: Yeah, I was going to ask, we're not really seeing that counter offensive in earnest at this point, right? We are beginning to see the -- I guess, the early, I guess, elements of that. But what does that mean in the long-term once that counter offensive gets started, based on what we've seen the Ukrainians accomplish so far, it sounds as though there's the potential for them to be fairly successful in this counter offensive once it really gets going in earnest?

CLARK: I certainly think so. What we're seeing right now is what are generally known as probing attacks by some of those Ukrainian forces, finding gaps in the Russian defensive lines, giving some experience to these Ukrainian units that have been equipped with western forces. And preparing for larger scale attacks in the future.

Now, Ukrainians have a few options of where they could launch that major attack. It seemed most likely it could be in the south, but there are several areas in eastern Ukraine they could attack as well. What they're hitting right now is the very initial Russian defensive line which some areas in the south have been quite well defended. But they're about 10 kilometers away from the main belt of Russian fortification.

[19:20:03]

What we're likely going to see in the next few weeks is the Ukrainians further finding gaps in those lines before eventually committing a broader number of those brigades that have been held back in reserves to a larger effort. And I am confident that they will be able to, at least in some portions of the line, push through Russian defenses.

ACOSTA: And, Mason, your organization looked at this recent dam explosion in Ukraine that really got the world's attention. What more do we know about it? What can you tell us?

CLARK: I think we have about all the proof we're ever likely to get that it was a Russian detonation of the dam. We've gotten a number of assessments by independent experts, seismologists and others, that it's highly likely that the explosion that destroyed the dam only could have come from inside, and the control room was under Russian control at the time.

Our assessment is that it was a Russian attempt to slow down or prevent any sort of Ukrainian offensive across the Dnipro River in Kherson Oblast, possibly even by a local commander. I'm not sure I would even say this was directed by the Kremlin.

We know that Russian forces prepared the dam for detonation as far back as last September, and it's likely that they were alarmed by Russian -- pardon me, Ukrainian cross river raids and landing actions in islands in the Dnipro River and decided to blow the dam prematurely in order to preclude that option for Ukrainian forces.

ACOSTA: All right, Mason Clark, thanks very much for your expertise. We appreciate it.

CLARK: Thanks for having me.

ACOSTA: All right, we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:26:05]

ACOSTA: Don't let the door hit you on the way out. That's the Republican Party's message to its 2024 presidential candidates who don't want to sign a pledge to support the eventual GOP nominee, even if it's a tried and convicted Donald Trump. But former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is making it clear he doesn't think much of the party's loyalty oath needed to make the first debate stage in August. This is what he said on CNN earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS CHRISTIE, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm going to take the pledge just as seriously as Donald Trump took it in 2016. I will do what I need to do to be up on that stage to try to save my party and saved my country from going down the road of being led by three-time loser, Donald Trump.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Joining us now to discuss Vanity Fair Special Correspondent Molly Jong-Fast and CNN Political Commentator S.E. Cupp. S.E., Chris Christie doesn't sound like he's on board with that pledge?

S.E. CUPP, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: He's right, and he probably has a pretty good memory of September 2015. I trace sort of the fate of the Republican Party back to that time when Reince Priebus, the guy you and I know and covered, rushed up to New York from Washington, D.C., paper in hand, to get Donald Trump to sign a loyalty pledge.

Now, that worked both ways. It married Donald Trump to the Republican Party. And the Republican Party to Donald Trump. And we all know how that went. I believe Chris Christie and others might be skeptical of this, not just because it would adhere them potentially to Trump, but because of what it would do to the Republican Party. It is a waste of time. And the Republican Party, I think, should be more discerning in determining who gets to wear the banner, who gets, you know, to take the mantle.

And I think they were a little too cavalier about that and willing back in 2015 and then later 2016, to let Donald Trump decide he was a Republican when we all know he had very little affection for the party conservatism or any of that, really.

ACOSTA: Molly, do you think that the party is going to give some of these candidates a hall pass on this pledge? What do you think?

MOLLY JONG-FAST, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, VANITY FAIR: Well, I mean, the funny thing is, I think if Trump hadn't won the nomination, I don't think he would have honored the pledge, and I think that's pretty clear. I thought the most interesting thing about the pledge was that they rejected Asa Hutchinson's very low bar of wanting the pledge to say that it's only if the candidate it has not been criminally charged. And the RNC was like, no, that's too high a bar. We're not going to have that for the pledge. I mean, if that isn't a really great metaphor for where this Republican Party is, I don't know what is.

ACOSTA: Yeah. And last evening, talking about the documents case, I spoke with former Republican Congressman Will Hurd. He was a former CIA Officer. He said that when I asked him if Trump placed the lives of U.S. intelligence officers at risk over his handling -- mishandling of classified documents. Let's listen to that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILL HURD, (R) FORMER TEXAS CONGRESSMAN: He absolutely could have put people's lives at risk for not returning these documents. And look, when I first read the indictment, it's shocking. We would not be in this situation if Donald Trump just gave the documents back.

(END VIDEO CLIP) ACOSTA: Yeah. S.E., I mean, we also had Leon Panetta on earlier on this program who essentially said the same thing, that lives were put at risk and that even Vladimir Putin would have been salivating over the prospect of documents floating around at Mar-a-Lago. Are you surprised that more Republicans have not more forcefully condemned Trump for this?

CUPP: No. No, I mean, I watched Republicans for four years defend the absolute worst.

[19:30:00]

You know, stuff that ranged from abuses of power to bad policy decisions, abandoning conservative policies to absolutely terrible rhetoric, defending anti-Semites, White nationalists, the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, QAnon, I mean, I could go on and on and on. This seems -- this is bad, but is it really worse than the for now, six, seven years of stuff that we've watched Trump do? I'm not surprised at all.

And, you know, the fact is they haven't been punished for defending him. In fact, they've been punished for criticizing him. They've been kicked out of the party, in the cases of Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger and Jeff Flake and name your good conservative. Defending Donald Trump is the norm.

ACOSTA: CNN HOST: Yes, it is sometimes a one-way ticket out of the party.

And Molly, I wanted to switch gears and ask you about Joe Rogan. It's a subject we haven't talked about in a while. He is offering a leading vaccine researcher, Dr. Peter Hotez, this has been bubbling up on Twitter today $100,000.00 to debate Democratic presidential candidate and anti-vaxxer, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. on his podcast.

Is this even a debate worth having? I mean, I've had Dr. Hotez on this program many times and he was one of so many experts in the field of virology, and so on, who helped the public get through the COVID pandemic.

What do you think? Should he do that kind of a debate?

MOLLY JONG FAST, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, "VANITY FAIR": No, he should absolutely not. And I would say that Dr. Peter Hotez is a lifelong public servant who worked on a low-cost vaccine for developing countries. The man has devoted himself to science. He's a pediatrician. He is incredibly good man. We both know him.

RFK, Jr. is a crank and an anti-vaxxer and we all know why these very wealthy tech bros are pumping him up at the last minute because they know or they're pretty sure that Republicans are going to nominate a very unelectable candidate in general, it's very possible they'll like Trump -- they'll nominate Trump, and then they are trying anything they can to prevent Biden from getting re-elected. And so, they're propping up this third party candidate.

I mean, this is not rocket science. This is what's happening and it is really, really clear.

I mean, you listen to RFK, Jr., the stuff he says, it doesn't even make any sense and there is no reason that Dr. Peter Hotez should even bother with it. He is elevating him by debating him.

ACOSTA: Yes, S.E., how do you think that this RFK, Jr. situation should be handled? I mean, he is, as Molly said, he's a crank. He's an anti-vaxxer. And yet, he is going to be a part of this political dialogue here for months on end because he is running in the Democratic primary.

What do you think? Should people be debating him? Should public health experts be debating him?

CUPP: Oh, yes, but you'd want to do that in a fair setting. I don't think Joe Rogan as moderator would be the best setting in which to have, I think, a very important and serious debate.

I wish the DNC would let Joe Biden debate because I'd like to see in a better setting with a moderator who is maybe a journalist, you know, who can do factchecking and sort of push back.

RFK and Marianne Williamson, and anyone else that gets in into the race, these are important topics. And let's not forget, it's not disqualifying to be a crank, it is not just disqualifying to be ignorant, you know, when you run for president, we all know that that's the case.

So I wouldn't underestimate RFK's appeal with or without the propping up by the tech bros. I mean, Molly is absolutely right, but he could appeal. And so yes, I think he should debate but in a setting that takes into account the seriousness of these topics.

ACOSTA: Hey, Molly, just finally. What should the White House -- the Biden campaign do about this? Should they do anything? Are they just going to have to spend the next several months just ignoring RFK, Jr.?

FAST: Well, Joe Biden is an incumbent, right? He is an incumbent president. I mean, generally parties don't have primaries when they have an incumbent president running again. So I think they should ignore him.

Look, he should not be the only person running for the primary in New Hampshire. I mean, the Biden administration, if they're going to have a primary should have him on the ticket, but obviously, the whole idea that this guy who has just magically appeared, who has connections to a lot of the right-wing media is suddenly a challenger for the incumbent president is completely insane.

And I would not let these people set the narrative. He's an incumbent president running for re-election. He doesn't need to debate RFK, Jr.

ACOSTA: All right, Molly Jong Fast, S.E. Cupp, thanks so much, ladies. Really appreciate it.

We'll be right back. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:39:08]

ACOSTA: Some Japanese-Americans who were forced into internment camps during World War Two are speaking out in support of reparations for Black Americans.

CNN's Stephanie Elam has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you so much. Thanks for your comments.

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Their pain is real.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Those are the harms that happened in my ancestors that we don't talk about.

ELAM (voice over): Their vision, clear.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Let's ensure recraft legislation that historically preserves our land, our history.

ELAM (voice over): Black Californians being heard in front of the state's Reparations Taskforce. Their passion understood by Amy Iwasaki Mass.

AMY IWASAKI MASS, FORCED INTO INTERMENT CAMP AS A CHILD: The government we trusted, the country that we loved --

The nation to which we had pledged loyalty at betrayed us, had turned against us.

ELAM (voice over): She, too, bared her soul to a government body considering reparations.

MASS: It was a pretty scary time.

ELAM (voice over): Mass was a Los Angeles first grader when she and her family and more than 100,000 other Japanese-Americans were rounded up by the federal government and sent to internment camps. The United States' response during World War Two, after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941.

MASS: They didn't have their guns out protecting us from the outside, they had the guns pointing at us.

ELAM (voice over): By the time her family left the Wyoming camp, three years later --

MASS: I knew that the United States didn't love us.

ELAM (voice over): Her family returned to Los Angeles, but the experience took its toll.

MASS: Our scars are deep and permanent.

ELAM (voice over): More than four decades later, Japanese-Americans were granted $20,000.00 and a formal apology.

MASS: If we didn't get reparations, if we felt we are still being put down by the government, I think that for me, it would be hard to fight.

ELAM (voice over): Mass is part of a growing wave of multiracial support for Black-American reparations. Many Jewish and Japanese organizations among them.

DON TAMAKI IS, MEMBERS, CALIFORNIA REPARATIONS TASKFORCE: I think there's a growing realization that in 1865, slavery ended, but that the bias simply morphed into other forms that not only put a target on the backs of African-Americans, but also other people of color.

ELAM (voice over): Don Tamaki is one of nine members on California's Reparations Taskforce, the first of its kind in any state.

His parents, natives of the San Francisco Bay Area were also in an internment camp. He even has a copy of the check his mother received from the federal government.

TAMAKI: There is no equivalence really between four years in a concentration camp and 400 years of systematic exclusion and discrimination.

But I think Japanese-Americans, as a group, do understand what it's like to be excluded on the basis of race, and I think there is a sense that African-Americans opened the door and everybody else walked through it.

ELAM (voice over): The taskforce is suggesting more than 100 proposals for California to address issues that have historically set the Black community back, including health harms, mass incarceration, and over policing, and housing discrimination.

TIMOTHY ALAN SIMON, CHAIR, AFRICAN-AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE: So it's really it's tragic that we're seeing this declining population.

ELAM (voice over): Native San Franciscan, Timothy Alan Simon says he has seen his Black neighbors move out of his Bayview community.

In fact, citywide in 1970, thirteen percent of the population identified as Black. Now that number stands at less than six percent.

SIMON: San Francisco has lost the brilliance to a large extent the cultural value, the economic contribution and innovation, all that's come out of the African-American community.

ELAM (voice over): Simon says educating the public about that loss is key and allies like Amy Iwasaki Mass are helping to shine light on that pain by exposing their own.

ELAM (on camera): Is it important for Black-Americans to get support from other Americans?

MASS: Absolutely, because when we were having trouble, Black people were being good to us. It's not the race, it is just as human beings.

ELAM (voice over): Stephanie Elam, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: Let's Lift Every Voice for a special holiday, a CNN concert event with some of the biggest names and music returns. Watch Juneteenth, a global celebration for freedom. Our live coverage starts tomorrow night at seven on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:47:56]

ACOSTA: Federal Reserve chief, Jerome Powell hit the pause button on interest rate hikes and there's new evidence that consumers keep spending as mortgage rates retreat. CNN chief business correspondent, Christine Romans unravels it all for us tonight Before the Bell.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Jim, it is safe to peek at your 401(k) again. Stock markets have been buoyant so far this summer. The Standard and Poor's 500 posting is longest winning streak since late 2021.

The stock market is officially entering a new bull market, up more than 20 percent from the low. Investors cheering evidence the economy remains resilient despite 15 months of aggressive Federal Reserve rate hikes.

The Central Bank held rates steady last week pausing to assess how well its inflation fighting campaign has worked.

Inflation is still above the Fed's two percent target, but has clearly peaked and the Fed chief almost marveled at how strong the job market is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEROME POWELL, US FEDERAL RESERVE CHAIRMAN: The labor market, I think has surprised, many if not all analysts over the last couple of years with its extraordinary resilience really. It is supporting spending, which in turn is supporting hiring and it is really the engine it seems that is driving the economy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Buoyed by wage growth and strong jobs, consumer spending unexpectedly rose in May. The recession so many experts have predicted just has not materialized, at least not yet.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN LEER, CHIEF ECONOMIST, MORNING CONSULT: One of the defining features of a recession is jobs growth in aggregate and we have never met that criteria over the last two years, while everyone has been on recession watch.

I do think it will become harder and harder for the economy to continue to add jobs in the second half of the year.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: The Fed's rate hikes have an unpredictable lag time and the Fed chief indicated two more rate hikes still to come.

Markets will be closed Monday for the Juneteenth Day holiday. The main event this week is congressional testimony from the Fed chief Wednesday and Thursday -- Jim.

ACOSTA: An update now on tonight's top stories: A deadly mass shooting near Chicago, one person is dead and at least 22 others injured. It happened at a Juneteenth celebration in Willowbrook, Illinois. Police have no suspects in custody.

[19:50:03]

In St. Louis, Missouri, one teenager is dead and nine others injured after a mass shooting there. Another teen was critically injured after being trampled as people rushed to get away. Police have a 17-year-old suspect in custody.

Secretary of State, Antony Blinken met with China's Foreign minister and other top diplomats in Beijing today. The State Department says they had a candid and constructive conversation and that the Foreign minister accepted Blinken's invitation to Washington.

In a few hours, the second and final day of diplomatic talks will resume. If all goes well, he may even get a face-to-face meeting with China's president, Xi Jinping.

In other news, new video obtained exclusively by the British tabloid, "The Mirror" shows aides of former prime minister, Boris Johnson partying it up at a 2020 Christmas event and openly mocking the government's own COVID lockdown rules.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is for a party.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As long as we don't stream that, we're like, bending the rules.

[LAUGHTER]

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: The footage shot at the Conservative Party headquarters is the first video evidence of a series of lockdown parties known as party- gate. It's release comes just days after Johnson resigned as a member of Parliament after a powerful committee determined he had misled Parliament about the gatherings.

There is a new effort to use hallucinogenic magic mushrooms as therapy. We'll explain it all next. We'll talk to somebody live who has tried it. That is our CNN correspondent, David Culver. He tried it and we will talk about that next.

You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

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ACOSTA: Could so-called magic mushrooms be key to easing depression and anxiety or even to fighting substance abuse? They're being studied for potential therapeutic effects.

Just minutes from now, CNN's David Culver takes us on a mind-altering journey on the whole story. Here's a preview.

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DAVID CULVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You describe a psilocybin experience as shaking the snow globe. What do you mean by that?

DR. ROBIN CARHART-HARRIS, HEAD OF THE CENTRE FOR PSYCHEDELIC RESEARCH, DIVISION OF BRAIN SCIENCES, FACULTY OF MEDICINE, IMPERIAL COLLEGE LONDON: Sometimes, you know, to make progress, you've got to break things down. So there's something about how these compounds like psilocybin stimulate the serotonin system that opens up the mind and the brain to potential change.

CULVER (voice over): Dr. Robin Carhart-Harris is going to see if psilocybin physically changes anything in my brain.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How's it going in there?

CULVER: All good.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're going to do some structural scans now.

CARHART-HARRIS: With the cabling scan, we can look at the health of the fibers, and we'll see their health before enough to your trip to Jamaica.

CULVER: And the trip while in Jamaica. Trips, I guess there'll be two.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And David Culver joins us now. So David, you tried magic mushrooms twice. What can you tell us about those experiences?

CULVER: Yes, two different trips as I mentioned there in that clip, Jim. These are two different dosing ceremonies, as they call them as part of this therapeutic retreat. And we have to stress that it is a therapeutic retreat. This wasn't recreational. The retreat structure in and of itself even required preparation

leading up to it, and then an integration period that followed the five-day retreat.

The biggest takeaway, I think, for me was, well, it's two parts. One was certainly the personal experience of finding what I didn't really expect and that was encountering kind of a peacefulness of some guilt that I had carried from losing loved ones in recent years, and not being able to be there towards the final grieving period in particular.

But then, I think the other aspect, it's the folks that you see there in these clips. It is the other participants and my being there and going through with this as a participant was, I think, primarily just to be a conduit of their stories.

I think initially, when we approached this and talked to them about doing it, they weren't comfortable having somebody who was just going to be this outside observer.

We talked about my partaking as a participant, that changed the dynamics, Jim, and I think they felt far more comfortable in saying, yes, we will divulge. We will open up, and they do in a very intimate, personal way.

ACOSTA: And this is illegal at the federal level, but just this year, Oregon legalized it for therapeutic use. Are a lot of people using it there. What do you find?

CULVER: Yes. So the rollout is just happening now and that is part of the reason why we wanted to go through with this Jamaica retreat. It's run by a company called Silo Wellness, and they are operating in Oregon and they are one of many companies in what is a burgeoning billion dollar industry that's now rolling out.

And the implementation while it was legalized a couple of years back now in Oregon by voters there, the implementation aspect is just happening. And there's a lot of regulations, there's everything from licensed service centers, so folks aren't just going to be able to go in and pick up some mushrooms and go home and take them, you have to do them on site with licensed facilitators, those who are trained and certified to administer the psilocybin, and you've got to use mushrooms from licensed labs.

So there's a lot of restrictions that are in place to try to keep this safe and secure, and the rollout is happening as you and I talk -- Jim.

ACOSTA: And what did doctors tell you about psilocybin? The long term effects? What it might do to you? What can you tell us about that?

CULVER: Well naturally, given I was going to participate in this I actually checked with my own doctor, and she was fine with it. And you know, she wanted to understand a bit about the setting and how it was not recreational, so much as a therapeutic one. The preparation leading into this, I mean, there's a lot of group

therapeutic Zoom calls that you're starting to get to know the other participants, starting to understand the science behind what the psilocybin might do to you and how quickly it might take effect.

As far as the lingering effects, I mean, I think you could say perhaps had more of a profound, you know, maybe even a spiritual takeaway than any sort of physical impact. Overall, it's been just something that I've sat with and kind of have a peace of mind.

ACOSTA: All right, fascinating. That's what they call reporter involvement.

David Culver, Thanks very much.

Can't wait to see the episode.

CULVER: Thanks, Jim.

ACOSTA: Really appreciate it. Don't miss this new episode of "The Whole Story" with Anderson Cooper, it starts next, only on CNN.

Reporting from Washington, I'm Jim Acosta. Thank you very much for joining me this evening. I'll see you next weekend. Have a great week, everybody.

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