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Israel Launches Large-Scale Raids Across Occupied West Bank; Nvidia Earnings Up 122 Percent in Second Quarter; Namibia to Kill More Than 700 Animals to Feed People Affected by Drought; Trump Campaign Involved in Confrontation with Arlington Cemetery Staff Member; Photos of Influencers Used in Fake Pro-Trump Accounts. Aired 12-12:45a ET
Aired August 29, 2024 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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COATES: While wearing earth tones? Well, in retrospect, it all seems so tamed compared to the flurry of political scandals these days. I mean, it was just a tan suit, not to mention Republican icon Ronald Reagan, wow, he wore the same suit. Obama actually honored the anniversary today, posting this side-by-side photo of him and Vice President Kamala Harris. The caption, "How it started, how it's going." Ten years later and it's still a good look.
Well, thank you all for watching. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" is next.
JOHN VAUSE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm John Vause, live from Studio H here in Atlanta. Coming up on CNN NEWSROOM.
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DAVID MENCER, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER'S OFFICE SPOKESPERSON (through translator): We are targeting armed terrorists from the air and the ground.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Bogged down in the south in Gaza, pinned down by Hezbollah in the north. Israeli forces target the West Bank with the biggest military operation in years, raising concerns of a third front.
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LARRY MADOWO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Namibia sees this as a necessary evil.
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VAUSE: Facing a devastating drought and widespread food shortages, Namibia's government orders a cull of wild life animals, including elephants and hippos.
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SEN. J.D. VANCE (R), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: She can -- she can go to hell.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: She is the cat's mother. How J.D. Vance tried to turn questions over a Trump campaign altercation at Arlington National Cemetery into an attack on Kamala Harris.
ANNOUNCER: Live from Atlanta, this is CNN NEWSROOM with John Vause.
VAUSE: Israel could soon be fighting on a three-front war after launching one of the biggest military incursions in the West Bank in years. The frequency and number of Israeli military operations in the West Bank have increased in recent months. And IDF officials described the latest offensive as a counter-terror operation, but Israeli forces rarely target multiple Palestinian cities simultaneously.
According to Palestinian officials, at least 11 people were killed during the raid, which involved airstrikes as well as attack drones and helicopters. Bulldozers were used to dig up streets. Israel says it was targeting a terrorist infrastructure, as well as weapons smuggled in via Iran into the West Bank. Palestinian officials condemn the operation, accusing Israel of blocking access to hospitals and obstructing ambulances.
CNN's international diplomatic editor, Nic Robertson, begins our coverage reporting in from Tel Aviv.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR (voice-over): Before dawn, the biggest Israeli raid into the occupied West Bank since the war in Gaza began October 7th. Airstrikes near a cluster of northern towns, Tulkarm, Jenin and Tubas, backed by hundreds of troops and border police on the ground.
The IDF says it's a counter terrorism operation, intended to thwart what they claim is a systematic strategy in Iran to smuggle weapons and explosives into the West Bank.
Outside Jenin, a drone strike killing three men in a vehicle whom the IDF claimed were terrorists and seriously wounding another. Near Tubas, the IDF says another airstrike killed four terrorists. This resident caught in a blast.
MASOUD NAAJA, TWO CHILDREN KILLED (through translator): In seconds, very fast. We felt like something came down on us from the sky, and there was an explosion. When I put my hand on my chest, it was all shrapnel and in blood.
ROBERTSON: The IDF also arresting people and surrounding hospitals, including Jenin's main hospital, Ibn Sina. They said to prevent terrorists using it as a base. Palestinian ambulances also appearing to be targeted by the IDF amid claims staff were beaten.
DR. YOUNIS AL KHATIB, DIRECTOR OF THE PALESTINIAN RED CRESCENT IN THE WEST BANK (through translator): The occupation army is clearly targeting medical crews and ambulances. The latest example is today at the Al-Faraa refugee camp. The staff were forced to come out of the car and the director of our center in Tubas was beaten.
ROBERTSON: As they have done in previous West Bank raids, the IDF using armored diggers to rip up streets they claim searching for roadside bombs.
In part, the IDF says the operation connected to this failed backpack bomb attack that only killed the bomber in Tel Aviv 10 days ago. It was the first of its kind in decades.
Hamas, however, reacting to the raid calling Palestinians to restart a suicide bombing campaign abandoned almost two decades ago.
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Unclear how long the operation will last, but by late Wednesday, Palestinian officials saying 10 people dead and more than 20 injured, making it one of the most deadly days in the West Bank since the Gaza war began October 7th.
Nic Robertson, CNN, Tel Aviv.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: And with us now from the West Bank city of Ramallah is Dr. Mustafa Barghouti, co-founder and leader of the political party, the Palestinian National Initiative. He's also an elected member of the Palestinian Legislative Council.
Dr. Barghouti, thank you for being with us.
Dr. MUSTAFA BARGHOUTI, PRESIDENT, PALESTINIAN NATIONAL INITIATIVE: Thank you. Nice to be with you.
VAUSE: I want you to listen to one account from an eyewitness from someone who lived through this military operation overnight about what he saw and his experience during this military operation by the Israelis. Here he is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FADI JUMAA, AL-FARAA CAMP RESIDENT (through translator): The Israeli army stormed Al-Faraa Camp violently using all available means, from helicopters to fighter jets, and carried out an air drops and used drones to target a group of residents and stormed the camp from several directions through patrols.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: And that's one account from one area where the Israelis were operating in past 24 hours. The intensity and frequency of these Israeli operations have been slowly building since October 7th.
Are you among those who are concerned that Israel essentially is trying to bring the war in Gaza now to the West Bank? BARGHOUTI: Absolutely. I think what Israel is trying to do is to bring
this war of genocide, which is taking place in Gaza, and which has taken the lives of more than 40,000 people, including 17,000 Palestinian children, to the West Bank. Not only the word of genocide, but also the acts of ethnic cleansing, and also the punishment of the whole civilian life. Putting refugee camps who are having very difficult life anyhow under siege for days, and then destroying their infrastructure completely and totally is absolutely unacceptable.
VAUSE: There is one school of thought that says that the Israelis would not open a third front because at this point in time, they simply don't have the resources or the military might to deal with three fronts at once.
BARGHOUTI: What kind of fronts we are talking about? I mean, this is the Israeli mighty army, which has more than 200 nuclear bombs, which has the largest air force, not only in the area, but maybe one of the biggest in the world, which has tanks. It's an army against what? Against some young people who are carrying some guns? It's totally unacceptable to present this as if it was a war between two armies.
Actually, it's a war by one army, which is vicious, which has done so many crimes against civilian population who are under their occupation. The West Bank is under Israeli military occupation already for 57 years. And this area was invaded already by Israel so many times. So to make it look like a war is absolutely incorrect. It's one sided war, a unilateral war on civilian population of Palestine.
VAUSE: You've got Hezbollah, though, in this equation which has something like 200,000 rockets, medium to long term range rockets pointed at the Israelis, and as well-equipped and well-armed, but I take your point.
A spokesperson for the Israeli prime minister described the offensive as a counterterrorism operation targeting multiple terror groups and terror cells. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MENCER (through translator): We apprehended wanted suspects. We located and confiscated weapons, M-16s, ammunition, and additional military equipment.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: An IDF spokesperson also says the current operation is not extremely different or special to previous operations. And at this point, no word on how much longer it could continue. But to that point of finding those weapons during these raids, where did they come from?
BARGHOUTI: Weapons that some people have in the West Bank and we are talking really about a small number of weapons comes from Israeli sources. It comes from the Israeli army itself with some Israeli soldiers steal weapons and then sell them in the black market. And there were many cases of soldiers that were arrested for that. So to claim that these weapons are coming from Iran or somewhere else, from somewhere else is absolutely incorrect.
And these are not Palestinian terrorists. The real terrorist here is the Israeli army which has killed so many thousands of Palestinians so far, and which continues occupation. What we need to end this cycle of violence is to end the Israeli military occupation, which has lasted so long. The longest military occupation in modern history.
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VAUSE: Well, ending that occupation does seem to be a priority from the U.S. in terms of a two-state solution and other Western countries. So that at least is something.
Since October 7th, though, attacks by Israeli settlers have killed or injured more than 100 Palestinians in the West Bank, where the more serious attacks happened earlier this month. So serious the IDF itself described it as a serious terror incident. Well, the U.S. sanctioned the Israelis involved in another attack earlier in the year.
Do those words, calling it a terror incident, those actions of sanctions ultimately mean very little when the current far-right coalition government in Israel has well-known anti-Arab bigots and extremists in senior leadership roles?
BARGHOUTI: You have to understand that those who are attacking Palestinians are not just the Israeli army, but also the illegal Israeli settlers who behave as gangs. And they are protected and supported by the Israeli army, and in reality, they are the ones who are practicing terrorism here. We are talking about 800,000 illegal settlers in the West Bank.
And the United States has done nothing practically to stop them because a few sanctions 23 or four or 10 people means nothing. The settlers themselves are governing Israel. Smotrich, who was the real governor of occupied West Bank, and the finance minister is himself a settler in Kedumim, which is built on a Palestinian village. And Ben- Gvir who is the minister of internal security is another settler who was accused of being terrorist before, even by the Israeli establishment.
So we are talking here about fascists who are running this Israeli government and conducting through terror against the civilian population of Palestine, whether in Gaza or in the West Bank. To claim that this is a war on terrorism is absolutely incorrect because the real terrorists here are the Israeli illegal settlers.
VAUSE: Mustafa Barghouti, thank you, sir, for being with us. Appreciate your time.
BARGHOUTI: Thank you.
VAUSE: Well, the U.N.'s World Food Programme suspending movement of staff in Gaza after one of its vehicles came under fire. The agency says the vehicle is struck at least 10 times while approaching an Israeli checkpoint Tuesday night. No one was injured but the U.N. says the vehicle that was clearly marked had an Israeli clearance to go through that area. The WFP plays a key role in distributing aid in Gaza where famine has been ongoing for months now. Israel's military says that incident is currently under review.
French prosecutors have placed the founder of Telegram under formal investigation. In French law, that's a step below being formally charged with a crime. Pavel Durov was released from police custody Wednesday and transferred to court for questioning. The Russian-born billionaire is barred from leaving France and has to report to French police twice a week. His bail set at more than $5.5 million.
Durov was arrested in Paris Saturday on a warrant related to a lack of moderation on the popular messaging app. Durov's lawyer says France's investigation is ridiculous.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAVID-OLIVIER KAMINSKI, PAVEL DUROV'S LAWYER (through translator): I'd like to add that it's totally absurd to think that the head of a social network could be involved in criminal acts that don't concern him either directly or indirectly.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Tech company Nvidia reports its second-quarter earnings were up 122 percent compared to the last financial year. Nvidia is famous for creating the GPU and redefining what computer graphics are actually capable of. Their work creating A.I. processes has propelled the company to new heights. Now one of only three U.S. company is valued at more than $3 trillion, that's with a T. Some experts wonder how long reality can keep beating expectations.
Live to Hong Kong now, CNN's Kristie Lu Stout.
You know, the most important tech earnings in years, Nvidia beat expectations again.
KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes.
VAUSE: But the shares a falling. What's happening?
LU STOUT: Yes, it's interesting, John. Look, Nvidia is the A.I. golden goose of the tech world. But after its latest report that came out overnight, it's not quite living up to all the stock height. Look, its fundamentals are strong. On Wednesday it beat estimates and reported second-quarter revenue of over $30 billion. It's up 122 percent from the same time a year ago. It's also forecasting third quarter revenue of $32.5 billion, which is modestly better than estimates.
And that was not enough to impress investors. You know, after the report was released we've been monitoring Nvidia shares and they have been trading lower. They've been trading lower in after-hours trade. Now, Nvidia is the benchmark for chips and for the entire A.I. industry. It accounts for around 70 percent of all A.I. chips sales. And you have tech giants like Google, like Microsoft, like Meta, they're all building out their A.I. infrastructure. They've been spending big on Nvidia products, on their processors that power A.I. That includes generative A.I., including applications like ChatGPT.
But Nvidia is also facing a number of challenges. Let's bring up this graphic for you. Those challenges include production delays for its next-generation chips, its Blackwell chips, potential for rising production costs, especially if TSMC, the Taiwan chip factory, raises fees.
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There's also antitrust concerns. You know, U.S. regulators have been probing Nvidia's business practices, and you also got rising competition from rivals, including Huawei, the Chinese tech giant. You know, but analysts, they point out, look, it's still early days. We are still at the dawn of the so-called A.I. revolution.
I want you to take a listen to this.
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DAN IVES, MANAGING DIRECTOR, WEDBUSH SECURITIES: This is going to be a $4 trillion mark cap in the next year along with Apple and Microsoft. This A.I. revolution just starting being led by godfather of A.I. Jensen of Nvidia. It continues to be I think more of our core poised in tech.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LU STOUT: Look, Nvidia reports earnings, it's become like the Super Bowl for the financial markets. I mean, this is a company that has inspired earnings support, listening parties at bars, memes have gone viral, and investors have just gotten so used to the fact that Nvidia can smash forecasts. They're simply not impressed when Nvidia merely beats them. So it's a little bit of reality clicking in.
Back to you.
VAUSE: A victim of their own success.
Kristie Lu Stout there live in Hong Kong.
LU STOUT: Precisely.
VAUSE: Golden goose. Thank you.
Well, feeding elephants, hippos and zebras to the hungry. When we come back, with half of Namibia's population suffering from drought and food shortages, authorities have come up with a controversial plan to say the least.
And was it about honoring fallen U.S. troops or scoring some political points? Details of an altercation involving the Trump campaign at the revered Arlington National Cemetery.
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VAUSE: Typhoon Shanshan has made landfall in Japan, bringing heavy rain, wind and storm surge to Japan's southernmost island. Officials issued emergency warnings for flashfloods, as well as landslides, and wind gusts of up to 185 kilometers per hour were reported east just when Shanshan came ashore. The typhoon expected to turn to the east weakened to a tropical storm by the end of the day.
Namibia has ordered a cull of hundreds of wild animals and use of meat to feed those struggling with hunger and food insecurity. Officials say more than 150 animals have already been killed, including elephants, zebras, and hippos. Half the population of Namibia or more than a million people are struggling with food shortages due to the worst drought there in a century. Drought has been made worse by the climate crisis and killed hundreds of elephants last year after their water sources dried up.
More now from CNN's Larry Madowo.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MADOWO: Killing hundreds of wildlife to provide food for hungry people is still a controversial move that may anger conservationists, but Namibia sees this as a necessary evil. The Ministry of Environment calling it a sustainability intervention. These animals will die anyway because of the effects of the drought there, the worst in 100 years.
The government of Namibia was forced to declare a state of emergency in May as more than half of the population could face acute food insecurity.
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That is why the Ministry of Environment is contributing these animals as part of the drought relief program by the government. 723 wildlife from 83 elephants, 60 buffalos, 30 hippos, 300 zebras, 100 blue wildebeest, 50 impalas, and 100 elands have been earmarked for this. More than 150 animals have already been killed, providing more than 125,000 pounds of game meat to those that need it, especially in rural parts of Namibia.
The drought here has been caused by the El Nino weather phenomenon, which has led to limited rainfall, but also the bigger picture here is because of the effects of climate change. The climate crisis is hitting Southern Africa especially hard right now. So that is the backdrop for this controversial move that the Namibian government says will also have reduced human wildlife conflict because of the drought.
Limited water, limited grazing lands has led to some deadly human wildlife conflict and they're hoping this helps alleviate some of that as well.
Larry Madowo, CNN, Nairobi.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Well, for more on this, we're joined now from New York, Christopher Barrett, professor of agricultural economy at Cornell University.
Thank you for being with us.
Thanks for having me, John.
VAUSE: OK. So Namibia's Environment Ministry says culling more than 700 wild animals, elephants, hippos, wildebeest, a few others, is also in the best interests of those animal populations. Here's part of a statement from the ministry.
"This offtake will assist in reducing the negative impact of drought. This will assist in managing the current grazing pressure and water availability caused by the drought."
Now, on the surface, this seems to be a rare, but responsible move in response to a devastating drought made worse by climate change. But could this also be an indication of what's to come as the planet gets hotter with governments taking drastic measures, you know, in response to extreme weather events?
CHRISTOPHER BARRETT, AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY PROFESSOR, CORNELL UNIVERSITY: John, this is obviously a rather unusual move by any government, but we are seeing more extreme weather events. Those have very serious consequences for people and in particular very serious consequences for our food systems. We have been facing climate change for roughly two decades now.
And that comes on top of slowing rates of investment in boosting our agricultural productivity. The confluence of those two things means food prices have been rising as everybody sees in the grocery stores and more people are hungry now than we had 10 years ago. So we have a confluence of several problems that unfortunately are prompting rather dramatic responses like the government of Namibia's.
VAUSE: And right now, the situation in Namibia seems to be especially dire. USAID had this assessment last month that El Nino induced has contributed to deteriorating food security conditions across the country. Nearly 50 percent of the population will likely face high levels of acute food insecurity and require urgent food assistance.
So as Namibia goes so too the rest of Africa, which seems especially vulnerable to food shortages caused by climate change and it seems right now, is there any reason to believe that will change?
BARRETT: Not really. In that we're going to see increased food demand, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. Keep in mind, the median age in Africa is 19 years old. The population is growing much faster there than anywhere else in the world. So that's more belies to fill. Add to that increasing incomes that caused people to buy more food, in particular more animal source foods which just requires feed.
And the pressure on the food system just continues to grow at the same time that climate cooperates less and less above all, cooperates less in the tropics.
VAUSE: Yes, there are a lot of challenges here in how we actually produce the food we eat. You mentioned it is under pressure. Agriculture yield is still growing, but not as quickly as they used to, not as quickly as demand is booming. This is from the "New York Times." Obesity has continued to rise, and the average of micronutrient content of dozens of popular vegetables has continued to fall.
There's always been this assumption that improvements in farming, better fertilizer, new technology would continue to improve and keep up with growing demand. You know, there was always this assumption, but clearly did they think this is going to continue, that this would never end? That it would just go on forever?
BARRETT: There was indeed great complacency depending upon how old one is. I'm 60 years old, over most of my lifetime, it was true that food production outpaced demand growth. And so we had steadily decreasing prices for food. People could increasingly afford a healthy diet. So we saw historically unprecedented declines in hunger and malnutrition around the world from roughly 1945 until 1990.
But then we began to take our foot off the pedal, so to speak. We stopped investing in, in boosting agricultural productivity.
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And one has to constantly innovate because agricultural systems are evolutionary systems. The pests and pathogens that try to take out our wheat and our corn and take down our livestock are constantly evolving in response to our production processes. So we have to continuously innovate just to hold constant.
VAUSE: Well, that opinion piece in the "New York Times" makes the point that the pressure on the present food system is not a sign that it would necessarily fail, only that it must change. And a lot has to change it seems. You know, will there come a time when we walk into a supermarket and there won't be, you know, every kind of fruit and vegetable that you want from anywhere around the world at any time of year? That seems something that can't last.
BARRETT: It's not clear that that's really the change that's going to happen. More we're going to find new methods of producing foods we're already familiar with. So we're already seeing rapid growth in something called vertical farming. The idea that we can grow indoors using very little water, using very little land, just growing up using very efficient administration of water and nutrients for plants.
The key driver there is energy and as the cost of solar power keeps falling exponentially, the viability of a vertical farming for high- value crops like berries or high-value greens that becomes increasingly commercially viable. So that's a good example of how the changes that we're facing right now are just going to induce change in how we produce foods we're already familiar with.
VAUSE: Times are changing.
Chris Barrett, thanks so much for being with us. Appreciate it.
BARRETT: Thanks so much for having me.
VAUSE: In a moment a moment of truth for Eva, Sophia, and Samantha, and their fake accounts posing as chic American women all supporting Donald Trump on X. The images, stolen photographs of European fashion and beauty influencers. This was the reaction from one of the real influencers when they found out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What's your reaction?
DEBBIE NEDERLOF, A GERMAN FASHION INFLUENCER: My -- to be honest, what the (EXPLETIVE DELETED), was my reaction.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
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VAUSE: Welcome back, everyone. I'm John Vause. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM.
The Trump campaign embroiled in controversy once again. This time apparently after a confrontation at Arlington National Cemetery, one of the nation's most sacred sites and home to many American service members buried there after serving their country.
Donald Trump was there to honor the 13 U.S. troops killed at Kabul Airport in Afghanistan three years ago during the U.S. withdrawal. He met with their families. However, the cemetery forbids the use of its hallowed ground for campaign activities.
A source has told NPR an official there tried to block the Trump team from filming, and his campaign staff verbally abused and pushed the official aside. Hmm.
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A Trump spokesperson denies that it got physical.
Republican vice-presidential nominee J.D. Vance claims there was no gross violation of federal law. And then he tried to shift the blame to the U.S. vice president, using some rather harsh language.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. J.D. VANCE (R-OH), VICE-PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Kamala Harris is disgraceful. You want to talk about a story out of those 13 brave, innocent Americans who lost their lives, it's that Kamala Harris is so asleep at the wheel that she won't even do an investigation into what happened. And she wants to yell at Donald Trump, because he showed up? She can -- she can go to Hell.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: CNN's Tom Foreman has a closer look at what's known about this altercation at Arlington. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: We lost 13 great, great people.
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This campaign video, produced during former President Donald Trump's recent visit to Arlington Cemetery, is now at the center of a firestorm, after Trump staffers verbally abused and pushed aside a cemetery worker, a source with knowledge of the incident told NPR.
Or, as a Democratic congressman put it, acted like bullies.
Cemetery officials will only say, quote, "There was an incident, and a report was filed." Others, including a former secretary of defense, are saying more.
MARK ESPER, FORMER U.S. SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: I think it should be investigated.
FOREMAN (voice-over): How did the confrontation come about?
Trump has been ripping into his Democratic opponents over the U.S. military's chaotic departure from Afghanistan.
TRUMP: Terrorists poured out of the prisons after Biden and Harris surrendered Bagram.
FOREMAN (voice-over): And he wanted to visit the graves of service members who died in the withdrawal with his own video crew and photographer in tow.
But cemetery officials say they specifically reminded team Trump of a federal law forbidding politicking there, and quote, "Photographers, content creators, or any other persons in direct
support of a partisan political candidate's campaign."
Trump's staff disputes the nature of the confrontation and says the worker, "clearly suffering from a mental health episode," is "a disgrace and does not deserve to represent the hallowed grounds."
TRUMP: He's not a war hero.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's a war hero.
TRUMP: He's a war hero --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five and a half years.
TRUMP: He's a war hero because he was captured. I like people that weren't captured, OK?
FOREMAN (voice-over): Still, Trump's relationship with the military has been fraught for years, from mocking the war hero John McCain, to calling service members "losers" and "suckers," which he denies, to recently saying the Presidential Medal of Freedom he gave to a GOP megadonor is better than the Medal of Honor.
TRUMP: Because everyone gets the Congressional Medal of Honor. They're soldiers. They're either in very bad shape, because they've been hit so many times by bullets, or they're dead.
FOREMAN: Amid all this, the Trump campaign is saying they did nothing wrong, and the Harris campaign is saying, in effect, it's Donald Trump. What did you expect?
Tom Foreman, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: And no response directly from Kamala Harris to what J.D. Vance had to say, the "go to Hell" comment.
The U.S. vice president is currently on a bus, touring the battleground state of Georgia, which President Joe Biden won four years ago.
Kamala Harris and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz visited a high school and also stopped -- and to get some barbecue. The Democrat strategy is to shave down the Republican lead in its traditional strongholds in rural Georgia while winning big in Georgia's largest city, Atlanta.
Harris and Walz will have their first interview since the Democratic convention right here on CNN with CNN's Dana Bash. It's right here on CNN, Thursday, 9 p.m. Eastern. Did I mention it's on CNN?
And we'll replay the interview Friday at 7 a.m. Eastern in London, 10 a.m. in Abu Dhabi. You'll see it only here. You're right, CNN.
Well, several European fashion influencers have become the faces of some fake pro-Trump accounts on X. Not because the influencers actually support Trump, or have anything to do with him, but their images were stolen and then reposted to promote pro-Trump agenda and some conspiracy theories along the way.
As CNN's Katie Polglase reports, some of those influencers are now really outraged.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KATIE POLGLASE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Debbie is heading home from work in Luxembourg, Northern Europe. Crossing the border into Germany, she races back to her son.
DEBBIE NEDERLOF, MODEL & SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGER: Hello.
POLGLASE (voice-over): And of course, Lou (ph).
But Debbie's day doesn't end there. She's also a professional model. Her image, not only her identity, but her source of income, helping support her and her son.
But it's been stolen, used in a pro-Trump account on X, attracting nearly 30,000 followers in less than six months.
NEDERLOF: Here's her now (ph). Yes, that's very crazy.
POLGLASE: And when you see these views -- you know, it's saying vote for Trump in 2024. What's your reaction?
[00:35:11]
NEDERLOF: My -- to be honest, what was my reaction? (EXPLETIVE DELETED) was my reaction. That was my reaction, because I have nothing to do with the United States, with Trump, the political things over there.
POLGLASE: And if people following this account believe that this is you, what do you want to say to them?
NEDERLOF: That's definitely not me. Definitely, it was never me, and it will never be me. And they have to unfollow, please.
POLGLASE: In fact, Debbie is not alone. In partnership with the Centre for Information Resilience, CNN found nearly 60 fake Trump-supporting accounts.
And from these, we identified nearly a dozen women, real women from across Europe -- from Denmark to the Netherlands and as far away as Russia -- whose identities are being used in accounts telling voters, American voters, to vote for Trump in the upcoming U.S. election.
POLGLASE (voice-over): Let's take a look at some of these accounts, like Alina (ph), 33 and voting for Trump. But she's not. She's really Kamilla from Denmark.
KAMILLA BROBERG, INFLUENCER: I think it's weird. Anything that can discriminate other people on my account, because it's my little universe. I don't think it's fair.
POLGLASE (voice-over): And this one, Eva. She even has a verified blue tick, which is supposed to weed out fake accounts.
NERIAH TELLERUP, INFLUENCER: You feel very taken advantage of, also because it's kind of my image. I don't want to think people think that I do what those profiles sometimes are promoting.
POLGLASE (voice-over): We run the suspicious X photos through a reverse image search engine and found they were lifted from Instagram posts. Certain patterns emerged.
The fake accounts repost each other. It's a sign of a coordinated campaign.
Here, several of the fake accounts post the exact same wording: "If you're voting for the man who survived an assassination attempt, I want to follow you." It's another sign the accounts are linked.
And that's not all. Some of the accounts manipulated the images of these women. Have a look at Debbie's post -- the original on Instagram, and now the fake one on X. Her hat now reads "Make America Great Again."
Look at this T-shirt before, and then "Trump 2024."
For now, we don't know who is behind all these accounts, but the former U.S. National Security Council spokeswoman, who also used to investigate fake accounts for Twitter, told us this.
EMILY HORNE, FORMER SPOKESPERSON, U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL: I don't think it's unreasonable to ask questions about could there be a state actor involved? We know that there are multiple state actors who have been using social media to try to sow disinformation campaigns in the run-up to the 2024 election.
POLGLASE (voice-over): But regardless, the accounts are reaching influential politicians.
Doug Mastriano, a Republican state senator for Pennsylvania, follows Debbie's fake account. CNN contacted the senator about the account but has not heard back.
Back in Germany, Debbie is shocked and upset that her image is being used in this way.
With President Trump now back on X and Elon Musk, the owner of X, throwing his weight behind him, fake pro-Trump content appears to be flourishing, silencing the real women affected.
Once again, women's rights at the very heart of this presidential election.
Katie Polglase, CNN, Trier, Germany.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: CNN has reached out to X regarding these accounts. No response yet.
However, the majority of those accounts were taken down before CNN first published the report.
In a moment, toymaker LEGO announcing plans to build a greener future, little brick by little plastic brick. Stay with us.
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[00:41:12]
VAUSE: Competition will begin in a few hours at the Paralympic Games in Paris after an opening ceremony in the heart of the capitol.
Paralympians marched from the Champs-Elysees to the largest square in Paris, Place de la Concorde. The event featured hundreds of artists and performers with disabilities and other impairments.
The president of the Paralympic Committee said he hopes for an inclusion revolution. More than 4,400 athletes are competing in 549 medal events over 11
days, ending September 8. There'll be a quiz on that next hour.
LEGO says it's cutting crude out of its products. The toy maker will phase out the fossil fuels used to make its signature bricks -- the ones that really hurt when you stand on them -- and replace them with renewable plastic by 2032.
The company will pay up to 70 percent more for the materials. A LEGO CEO told CNN's Anna Stewart it does not plan to charge customers any more.
How about that?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANNA STEWART, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: How much more expensive do you think a brick that has zero fossil fuel in it would be, compared to now? And will you really not pass any of that cost on to the consumer?
NIELS CHRISTIANSEN, LEGO GROUP CEO: I don't know exactly how it looks in 2032, but I know right now, we are paying a considerable premium to get these kind of materials in there. And -- and it's something that I think consumers really want.
So I feel kind of obligated that we do this. And being privately owned and being able to make these kind of decisions, we're pushing this forward. And by now, we don't see consumers really ready to take on the cost.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: LEGO announced a 26 percent jump in profits for the first half of the year. Sales to consumers grew 14 percent, outperforming the wider toy industry.
Wonder (UNINTELLIGIBLE) selling to.
I'm John Vause, back at the top of the hour with more CNN NEWSROOM. But first, WORLD SPORT starts after the break.
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[00:45:38]
(WORLD SPORT)
