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Louisiana Holds Firm on Ten Commandments in Classroom; Simone Biles Wins Another Olympic Medal; Interview With Charleston, South Carolina, Mayor William Cogswell. Aired 11:30a-12p ET
Aired August 05, 2024 - 11:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[11:30:00]
JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: Congressman of Ohio Tim Ryan, thanks a lot, appreciate it.
FMR. REP. TIM RYAN (D-OH): Thank you, sir.
ACOSTA: All right.
In the meantime, Tropical Storm Debby is slamming Florida. Now Georgia and South Carolina are bracing for historic rainfall. Charleston alone could get a month's worth of rain in a single day.
We will speak to that city's mayor next. That's just in a few moments from now. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[11:35:06]
ACOSTA: New developments tell you about, about Tropical Storm Debby.
Moments ago, we learned of the first confirmed death, a 13-year-old boy, we're told, crushed by a tree that fell on his mobile home in Levy County, Florida.
Also new this morning, a tornado watch is now in effect for 11 million people from Central Florida to Southeastern Georgia, the threat whipped up by the Category 1 hurricane that charged ashore with 80 mile-per-hour winds in Florida's Big Bend region. Another huge concern is the catastrophic rainfall and the potentially deadly flooding that will follow.
Some areas are bracing for as much as 30 inches of raining.
And joining us now is the mayor of Charleston, South Carolina, William Cogswell.
Mr. Mayor, thank you very much for joining us.
What are you expecting over the next couple of days? And I know Charleston has some of those low-lying areas, flood-prone areas. I'm sure you're concerned about all that.
MAYOR WILLIAM COGSWELL (R), CHARLESTON, SOUTH CAROLINA: Absolutely. You make a good point.
We are at basically zero sea level, and we are anticipating unprecedented amounts of rainfall. And when you couple that with potential storm surges and just, again, the level of rainfall, we're going to have some real issues here.
ACOSTA: And is your city equipped to handle all of that? Or is it just something you're going to have to ride out? It's such an amazing city with a lot of historic buildings and homes.
COGSWELL: Well, you never know what Mother Nature is going to throw at you.
But I can say that I have a lot of confidence in our first responders. Unfortunately, this is not their first rodeo. They are well-trained. They are professional and organized. So while I do have confidence in them, again, this is going to be an unprecedented amount of rainfall that will result in pretty severe flooding and in areas that don't normally flood.
And so we're trying to take all precautions that we can, collaborating with our federal, state and local partners. And I'm optimistic that we're prepared. But, again, you never know what's coming down the pike.
ACOSTA: Yes, I was going to ask you, Mayor, what preparations you're making right now? Are you considering perhaps a curfew? Apparently, they have done that in Savannah. They have issued a curfew beginning tonight.
COGSWELL: We're -- we're prepared for that. We have not yet issued one. We're going to wait and see what the storm does later on today.
But we have enacted some emergency protocols that gives me the authority enact curfew if it is necessary and to close down parts of the city. We are asking, of course, for people to stay home, to prepare their properties, gather supplies now, well in advance of the storm, because we do not want people going out once the storm really hits.
Again, we have our emergency responders. They are well-prepared. They are very organized and trained, of course, to rescue people. But we don't want them going out unless they have to, so really urging people to stay safe and to stay inside.
ACOSTA: All right, Mayor William Cogswell of the great city of Charleston, South Carolina, thanks very much for your time.
Stay safe, sir. Thanks for your time.
COGSWELL: Thank you.
ACOSTA: All right, coming up: It may be the final week of the Paris Olympic Games, but the competition is still on fire.
We will hear from American shot-putter Ryan Crouser about his third gold medal. That's after the break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[11:43:12]
ACOSTA: It's the final week of the 2024 Summer Olympics, but the excitement of the Paris Games is still going strong. Let's take a look at the medal count.
The U.S. is still dominating overall with a total of 75 medals. But China has the most gold medals with 21. It was a photo finish, by the way, for the world's fastest man in the 100-meter dash Sunday night. American Noah Lyles took that title and the gold medal by just five- thousands of a second.
Let's put that into perspective. The blink of an eye lasts 20 times longer than the gap between Lyles and the silver medalist. If you watch that race, it was just unbelievable. The race was so close that seven of the eight sprinters saw the word photo next to their name on the scoreboard, meaning a closer inspection was, of course, needed.
And over in the gymnastics competition, it's been amazing. Simone Biles secured a silver medal in her final event of the Paris Olympics. She took second in the floor exercise behind Rebeca Andrade of Brazil.
But in a shocking turn of events, Biles failed to medal in the balance beam final earlier today.
CNN Sports' Coy Wire joins us now from Paris.
Coy, Simone Biles is a force. She's been amazing. Love the tweets, everything that she does. It's been incredible, but there was a little bit of a stumble today on the beam. What can you tell us?
COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: Yes, a couple of them.
But she knows this is about so much more than just her, right, Jim? I mean, for her to finish out her 2024 Olympics with a silver, to add to the three golds she's won already here, incredible. As you mentioned, missing out medaling on the beam earlier today, but then she goes to the floor not long later and puts on a jaw-dropping routine.
She stepped out of bounds a couple of times, likely costing her the gold, but her difficulty level, Jim was so high on another level that she still won silver, a triple-twisting double backflip at one point. Tom Brady was in the stands. His jaw dropped. You could see him saying, "That's ridiculous."
[11:45:10]
Brazil's 25-year-old star Rebeca Andrade won that gold, her first gold of the Games. It was an incredible moment afterwards. Jim, sportsmanship on full display, Simone and fellow American Jordan Chiles bowing down to Andrade on the podium. She's going to be framing that one.
Five medals in all for Biles at these games for an American record 11 in her Olympic career.
Finally, the man with perhaps the most powerful right arm on the planet, Team USA's Ryan Crouser, has won Olympic gold for a third straight time. Nobody else has ever won three, period. I caught him up with him just a bit ago today to talk about his incredible journey.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RYAN CROUSER, OLYMPIC GOLD MEDALIST: This one has definitely been the most enjoyable, and not because it's been easy. It's been the complete opposite.
It's just been frustrating this year with injuries and setbacks and kind of asking myself, like, can I get back to the level that I need to be at to be competitive against these guys, questioning, like, can I get to where I need to be?
And so just kept moving forward, doing what I still was able to do. So that kind of makes this one mean the most, because the most kind of went into this, kind of committed just to making it through. Like, when I couldn't throw because of the elbow, you only have so much time in the day. So instead of throwing, all right, we're going to spend some more time doing sprints, more time doing plyos.
If I can't bench, OK, I'm going to have an extra squat session this week. So it was kind of figuring out a way to stay productive, despite constant setbacks. So I feel like this medal reflects that.
WIRE: Well, this right here is one of the most powerful right arms on the planet. And I just want to do a little arm wrestling, ready, on mark, set -- no, never mind. Never mind. I like my arm.
(LAUGHTER)
WIRE: Cut.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WIRE: Thirty-one years old, Jim, three-peat Olympic champ. He's self- coached, practices in his backyard. He journals. He's meticulous.
And, yes, that right arm and his right-hand, Jim, is actually bigger than his left because he's trained it to be a cannon.
ACOSTA: Wow.
WIRE: Just absolutely phenomenal to see these athletes up close and personal and get inside their minds a bit. He's actually coaching another athlete at these Games, Jim, so he's not done.
And he said he was more nervous coaching here than competing.
(LAUGHTER)
ACOSTA: Wow.
WIRE: He said his beard was all twisted up because he was so nervous twisting it.
But Crouser might not be done. He did not rule out going for yet another Olympic gold medal at the 2028 Games back in his homeland in L.A. We will see.
ACOSTA: Great stuff.
I'm glad you didn't take up that offer on arm wrestling, or I'm glad he didn't take that up.
(LAUGHTER)
ACOSTA: Could have gotten messy there. That's a big guy.
Coy Wire, thank you very much. Appreciate it.
WIRE: You got it, buddy.
ACOSTA: All right, good to see you.
In the meantime, it is the dog days of summer, of course, and take a look at this. These dogs are celebrating by hanging 10. They hit the waves at the World Dog Surfing Championships in the Pacific of California. They were judged on the length of their ride technique and size of the wave.
The big win -- oh, my goodness. Look at that little dog, took a tumble there. The big winner this year was a chocolate Lab from Brazil. Some of the dogs' owners shared their excitement.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES WALL, DOG OWNER: I grabbed the surfboard. She starts crying like she wants to go. So, ever since then, it's just been like, all right, you're the surfer in the family.
STEVE DROTTAR, DOG OWNER: Whether we win or not tomorrow morning, Rosie and I will be surfing at Pleasure Point together. So we win no matter what.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ACOSTA: This is an annual competition that helps raise money for dog surfing and environmental nonprofits.
It's got me in the mood to take Duke back to the beach. I just took him to the beach for the first time. Did not do surfing. Look at that little guy right there, the shark fin on the back. Love it. Great stuff. All right, thanks a lot.
We will be right back. We will be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[11:53:12] ACOSTA: All right, this just in. Louisiana officials are digging in when it comes to the state's controversial law that requires public school classrooms to display a poster of the Ten Commandments.
CNN correspondent Jessica Schneider joins us now.
Jessica, the press conference, we just saw a few moments comes just days before the start of the new school year.
JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes.
ACOSTA: But it sounds like they are standing firm. This is going to happen, as far as they're concerned.
SCHNEIDER: As far as they're concerned.
This press conference was the attorney general, the Republican governor saying this law mandating that the Ten Commandments be displayed in all public classrooms ranging from kindergarten to college, they say that this law is on firm constitutional footing.
The reason why they had this press conference, though, was because at the end of June, right after this law was signed -- this bill was signed into law, there was a challenge from the ACLU, from multifaith families, and they are now confronting this challenge in federal court.
So the state officials are putting up posters and they're announcing that their brief will be filed defending this law today. It's set to go into effect January 1, and as part of this lawsuit, state officials have agreed not to enforce the law any time before November 15.
So there's still some time here. It's unclear if schools have already started to put this poster up, but this is going to be a big legal fight, Jim. I mean, the last time the Supreme Court weighed in directly on this case was 1980, where they struck down a very similar Kentucky law.
But, of course, the Supreme Court has changed drastically since 1980. We now have a 6-3 conservative court, and it was just two years ago that they ruled in favor of a football coach praying on the field after games. So who knows? Maybe Louisiana sees a little bit of wiggle room here from the Supreme Court to reverse precedent and allow something like this. It's something they're willing to fight.
[11:55:01]
ACOSTA: But, very quickly, I mean, it's possible that this will get blocked before it goes into effect.
SCHNEIDER: It is. There's a lawsuit pending in federal court right now. It's possible a judge steps in and says, we're not going to let this go into effect as this legal challenge plays out.
But that hasn't been decided yet. We will see.
ACOSTA: All right, Jessica Schneider, we will keep an eye on it. We know you as well. Thanks so much.
And thank you for joining me here in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jim Acosta.
Stay with us. "INSIDE POLITICS WITH DANA BASH" starts after a short break.
Have a great day.
