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U.S. Senate to Vote Contraception Access Bill; U.N. Chief Calls for an End to Advertising from Oil, Gas and Coal Companies; Heat Dome Sends Temp into Triple Digits Across Western U.S.; Boeing's Historic First Crewed Launch. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired June 05, 2024 - 10:30   ET

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

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ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: It's been two years today since Roe versus Wade was overturned, and this morning, Senate Democrats are forcing their GOP colleagues to say where they stand on contraception. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer says lawmakers will vote son a right to conception bill today. He calls the Roe reversal one of the worst Supreme Court decisions of modern times.

He also warns that state abortion bans are just the tip of the iceberg, and the Republican Extends to contraception as well. The Biden campaign is hosting a press call right now to highlight how if elected Donald Trump and his allies plan to attack access to contraception.

Joining us now is the President and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, Nancy Northup. Nancy, thanks so much for being here. So, Republicans say that this contraception bill is too broad. And unnecessary GOP Senator John Cornyn said, "It's a phony vote because contraception, to my knowledge, is not illegal. It's not unavailable." Your response.

NANCY NORTHUP, CEO, CENTER FOR REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS: Well, as you pointed out, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade two years ago. That rested on the fundamental right to make these bodily decisions for oneself. And contraception could be in the crosshairs next. It's really important that we codify in federal law that there is a right to contraception.

So, I would disagree with any notion that people should not be concerned. We saw what happened with IVF in Alabama. You've got to be sure that the whole range of reproductive health care is guaranteed in federal law. We can't just depend on the courts.

CAMEROTA: Nancy, I don't want to make you have to speak for conservatives, but because you live and breathe this issue, maybe you could help us understand their viewpoint. They want to ban all abortion and they want to ban various methods of contraception. So, is the goal to have more babies in the U.S. that the parents of the system can't afford and care for? How do they explain what the consequences of this will be? NORTHUP: Well, I cannot explain what there are looking to do, but I can explain what the consequences have been. I mean, we have just -- unfortunately on Friday, the Texas Supreme Court ruled against 20 women that we've been representing in that state because of the abortion ban who were denied access to abortion care despite the fact that their pregnancies went terribly wrong. The lead plaintiff in that case, Amanda Zurawski, ended up in the ICU for three days fighting for her life.

And so, this is the consequence of when you deprive access to reproductive health care. And the reality is we have got to make sure that we get these rights back because women are suffering in states that ban abortion.

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CAMEROTA: The topic of contraceptives is on the front page of "The Washington Post" this morning. It says, "Far-right conservatives are sowing misinformation that inaccurately characterizes IUDs, emergency contraception, even birth control pills, as causing abortions." What can you do about this misinformation?

NORTHUP: Well, people have to understand that contraception is contraception. It prevents pregnancies from happening. And it is unfortunate that this misinformation has been pushed for years. I mean, people in America want to have choices about their contraceptive methods and to suggest that IUDs and some forms of birth control actually are not contraception but abortion is just part of the misinformation. And it shows that this is an attempt to cut back and cut back and cut back on access to ability to control one's reproductive health.

CAMEROTA: All right. We will see what happens in Congress today. Nancy Northup, thank you so much for your time today. And a quick correction to what I said. I said it's the two-year anniversary of Roe being overturned, today it's not. It's actually June 24th. It's this month, not today.

All right. Meanwhile, a grim new climate warning from the U.N. as a heat dome slams 17 million Americans with life threatening triple- digit temperatures.

And the countdown is on. A third attempt at an historic space launch is moments away. Stay with us.

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CAMEROTA: Excessive heat warnings in effect for millions of Americans today as a so-called heat dome heats the West Coast. U.N. Secretary- General Antonio Guterres delivered a speech moments ago urging countries and corporations to rein in the climate crisis over the next 18 months. CNN's Bill Weir has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Across the American heartland came a conga line of devastating tornadoes, deadly flooding from Brazil to Germany, a drought that has millions rationing water in Mexico City and temperatures close to 122 degrees in India, enough to kill at least 33 poll workers on the same day in recent national elections. All are snapshots from a planet overheated by human activity, where monthly heat records have been shattered for the last 12 months in a row.

WEIR: As somebody who has been studying sort of with intimate knowledge the climate crisis all these years, what do you make of what's happening around the world these days?

KIM COBB, DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE FOR ENVIRONMENT AND SOCIETY, BROWN UNIVERSITY: I mean, Bill, this is just a dizzying rate of change that we're experiencing right now. But in the near future, 2023 will register as a normal year. Whereas, in fact, if you look at those graphs, all you can see is a vertical line shooting upward from the very recent warmest years on record. So, really just a record smashing year in 2023.

ANTONIO GUTERESS, U.N. SECRETARY-GENERAL: Let me be very clear again. The phase out of fossil fuels is essential and inevitable. No amount of speed or scare tactics will change that. Let's hope it doesn't come too late.

WEIR (voice-over): While the head of the United Nations has been railing against polluters and petrostates for years, he is using this report to plead with world leaders to cut dirty fuels faster than ever. To kick in more for unfair loss and damage in developing countries and to ban all advertising from oil, gas and coal companies.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you could see the inside of your engine.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We at Chevron believe that nothing is more precious than life.

WEIR: What do you make of the secretary-general's decision to really take new steps, to call for an end to fossil fuel advertising on television and radio, to treat those ads the way you would for tobacco products?

LIZ BENTLEY, CHIEF EXECUTIVE PROFESSOR, ROYAL METEOROLOGICAL SOCIETY: Any policies that we can introduce at national level or even international agreements to actually change the way we rely on fossil fuels are important. So, these actions, as you say, to treat fossil fuel adverts as if it would be, you know, we treat banning conversations around tobacco or at least warning signs if you do smoke, these are the consequences. We need to get, I think, more savvy to do that around greenhouse gas emissions as well.

WEIR (voice-over): To avoid the worst, scientists say global emissions must fall 9 percent a year until 2030. And while they still went up last year, it was only by 1 percent thanks to a boom in clean wind and sun power, a sign that humanity could finally be on the verge of bending the carbon curve. COBB: Yes, 1 percent is in the wrong direction, but it's getting close to zero and then it can start going into the negative territory. So, in fact, we are predicted to have peak fossil fuel emissions within the next year or two, which is something I frankly never saw coming even five years ago. So, that's real progress. And I think people need to really appreciate that.

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CAMEROTA: And joining us now is CNN's chief climate correspondent, Bill Weir. So, Bill, explain what this heat dome is that millions of people are under, and what does it have to do with climate change?

WEIR (on camera): Well, we just live on an overheating planet, Alisyn. So, it is hotter in places where it always was hot, but just much hotter now. It's hotter in places where it never was before, high latitudes as well.

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So, heat is this silent killer. It creeps up on older folks in older homes. Care must be taken to check on those folks, vulnerable people in these neighborhoods. And we saw last year place like Phoenix, it stayed over 110 degrees for a month. And when your body can't cool down, if it doesn't cool down at night, it's a huge consequence.

The secretary-general speaking today at the American Museum of National History, using dinosaurs as a backdrop to talk about extinction level events, calling it a highway to hell with the godfathers of the climate crisis, that's oil and gas CEOs with their feet on the pedal. Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Bill Weir, thank you, as always, for your reporting on this.

All right. Now, to Boeing's Starliner spacecraft, it's set to launch on its historic flight in just a few minutes, and we're going to bring you there live when we come right back.

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CAMEROTA: Happening just moments from now, Boeing's Starliner spacecraft is scheduled to blast off from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Two astronauts -- NASA astronauts are on board and this is their third time attempting this launch.

If successful, this will be the Starliner's first ever space flight mission with a crew. CNN's Kristin Fisher is live at the Kennedy Space Center for us. So, Kristin, does it look like this is a go?

KRISTIN FISHER, CNN SPACE AND DEFENSE CORRESPONDENT: You know, Alisyn, I would never say that I think we're going to get to see a space launch today because that would just jinx things. And because this is Starliner, a spacecraft that has been delayed for years. But if I were to say such a thing, that would be right now. Because we are now just one minute and 45 seconds away from liftoff of the first crewed flight of Boeing's Starliner spacecraft. The weather looks good. They successfully troubleshooted all of those ground computer problems. And so, the two NASA astronauts on board, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams have just delivered their final pre-launch speeches. Their visors have closed and they are now ready for liftoff. If all goes according to plan, they will be spending eight days aboard the International Space Station.

And, Alisyn, the reason this is so critical is because NASA wants redundancy. NASA does not want to be dependent strictly on SpaceX to get its astronauts to the International Space Station, not does it want to be reliant upon the Russian Soyuz rockets to get its astronauts up there.

So, this is about having more options for NASA and its astronauts to allow them to focus on bigger, loftier goals like returning American astronauts to the moon for the first time since the Apollo program, Alisyn. So, here we go. 48 seconds away. All systems go for launch, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK. So, Kristin, I mean, very, very quickly, tell us about the astronauts. Tell us investments about Suni and Butch.

FISHER: They are as experienced of NASA astronauts as you can possibly get. Both two navy test pilots. Butch spent his final day here on Earth before what we hope will be liftoff fishing. And Suni Williams actually went for a run on the beach. That's how they chose to spend their final few minutes on planet Earth before liftoff. Now, just 16 seconds away. Let's listen to the official NASA countdown.

CAMEROTA: OK. Let's do that. We are almost 10 seconds away from this, folks. Listen in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Houston. Starliner (INAUDIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Gradual (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got a good throttle up.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good throttle.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good SRB burnout.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good SRB.

CAMEROTA: Well, that was goosebump inducing. And, Kristin, it caught us a little bit by surprise because we didn't hear the 10, 9, 8 countdown. But what a view already from the spacecraft looking back at Earth.

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And it seems like -- I mean, you know better than us, but did this go off without a hitch? FISHER: Well, it's still very early into the mission. But so far, everything looking very good, nominal, as they like to say at NASA. I mean, just think about this, Alisyn, this launch a decade in the making. This is really the beginning of NASA's dream of making commercial spaceflight a reality, and not just a reality with SpaceX, but with multiple providers.

They want that redundancy. They want the ability for NASA astronauts to have some options in case something goes wrong with one of those other spacecrafts. So, what we're seeing right now, everything looking really good, but we still have a lot some critical moments ahead. And I just want to walk you through what we're about to see.

So, this is Boeing Starliner spacecraft and the capsule on top of the rocket. This is where the two NASA astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are right now. But momentarily, this capsule is going to separate from the rocket. The Atlas V rocket built and operated by different company, the United Launch Alliance. That is a critical moment. One of the more dangerous moment, so to speak, aside from the actual liftoff. So, that's something we're going to be watching very closely.

But if all of that goes according to plan, you have MECO, main engine cutoff, then what you're going to see is Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams finally getting to test out Boeing Starliner spacecraft in space. And they're going to be spending about eight days up at the International Space Station, testing out the spacecraft itself, but also delivering some cargo to the crew that's already up there.

And you know, Alisyn, they're bringing a lot of supplies, but one of the things that's most important right now, it's easy to kind of laugh about this, but you know, going to the bathroom of the International Space Station is pretty important. And up there, they recycle all of the astronaut's urine, turn it into drinking water, but there's a problem with that recycling pump. The urine recycling pump, so to speak.

So, they're bringing up a replacement part to hopefully rid the astronauts up there of all the bags of urine that are sitting around the space station right now. So, it's not just the astronauts that are going up to the ISS but cargo as well.

So, right now, we are past Max Q, that's the point when the most stress is placed on the rocket. So, a huge milestone there. And you can apparently see the entire U.S. coast from the rocket. I don't have a good display of it right in front of me, Alisyn. But so far, this is looking really, really good.

And so, you know, for Boeing, this is a space flight that they really needed to go successfully. They needed to prove that they could compete with Elon Musk's SpaceX. And, you know, this is also just coming at a tremendous moment for space flight in general, because you have another big launch scheduled for tomorrow. SpaceX's Starship, which is going to someday land NASA astronauts on the moon and perhaps someday go on to Mars. So, that's really a critical piece of this puzzle here, Alisyn, because NASA needs Boeing Starliner to work so we can focus on Artemis and some of those other missions as well.

CAMEROTA: Well, Kristin, I'm so glad -- first of all, there's a lot there, but I'm so glad that you told us about how it's designed to have pieces of equipment peel off, because we are seeing that, we're seeing some pieces peel off. And -- but everything is fine because that was by design. And of course, I'm glad that you told us about the urine filtration system that I really think should need to work. That that's also feels very important. How long will it take them to get to the International Space Station?

FISHER: Yes, it's going to take them about 24 hours to get there. And then one of the other critical moments is, you know, this spacecraft, this capsule, has to actually dock with the International Space Station. They've done it before during the uncrewed test flight, and that was successful, but this will be the first time that you actually have two astronauts on board during a docking with the ISS.

Important to point out, though, you know, these are two of the most experienced and highly trained NASA astronauts, both navy test pilots. For both of them, this is their third test flight. And, you know, for a test flight -- sorry, their third space flight, but their first test flight. And a test flight is particularly important and given sort of extra weight because, of course, it's the first time that any people have been inside. And so, that's why these two astronauts were chosen.

And you know what, Alisyn, this is also a, a big deal because it's only the sixth time in U.S. history that there has been a first crude test flight of a new spacecraft. You had Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, the space shuttle, SpaceX's, crew, Dragon, and now Starliner.

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