Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Newsroom
North Carolina Voters React to Presidential Debate; Images Show Kim Jong-un at Uranium Enrichment Site; DR Congo to Deliver Verdict in Alleged Coup Attempt Trial; Polaris Crew Spacewalks into History Books. Aired 4:30-5a ET
Aired September 13, 2024 - 04:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:30:00]
MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM, I'm Max Foster. If you're just joining us here are today's top stories.
33,000 union members at Boeing are now on strike after overwhelmingly rejecting a new contract with the troubled aircraft manufacturer. It's the first strike at the company in 16 years. Union leaders had described the deal as the best it had ever negotiated with Boeing.
Vladimir Putin is warning NATO countries against letting Ukraine use their long range missiles to strike Russia. Putin told reporters it would mean NATO members, including the U.S., are quote, at war with Russia. He said Russia would then have the right to decide how to respond.
U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are back on the campaign trail. Harris is calling for another debate and Trump insists there won't be one. He rallied in Arizona while Harris campaigned in North Carolina. Both are swing states likely to play a major role in deciding the election.
The state of North Carolina hasn't gone to a Democrat since former President Barack Obama won it in 2008. But Kamala Harris is making a big play for voters there. A recent poll shows Harris ahead by 3 percent among likely voters. That's within the margin of error. But that's putting pressure on Trump, who won the state by just over 1 percent against Joe Biden in 2020. The state's governor says he's optimistic for a Harris victory.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. ROY COOPER, (D) NORTH CAROLINA: If Kamala Harris can win here, then she's the next president of the United States. So I think this is her 18th visit to North Carolina as vice president. Her presence here means a lot. So coming here as much as she can, we obviously want to see.
They're not that many people who haven't made up their mind. But there are a lot of people who haven't made up their mind whether they're going to vote. If we can get those people to the polls, which I believe we can, Kamala Harris can win North Carolina.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: CNN's Dianne Gallagher is gauging voter reaction in North Carolina days after the presidential debate.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE U.S. (D) AND U.S. PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Are we going to do this North Carolina?
CROWD: Yes!
DIANNE GALLAGHER, CNN U.S. NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Vice President Kamala Harris back in battleground North Carolina.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm feeling a lot of hope now, which I wasn't feeling before.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): Fresh off a debate performance, her supporters believe will help flip the state blue in November.
AMY STEELE, REGISTERED DEMOCRAT: Races are won or loss on the margin in North Carolina. I think she did enough to convince people who were on the fence to go toward her way.
RAKI MCGREGOR, REGISTERED DEMOCRAT: She came out on top. It wasn't close, head and shoulders.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): Republicans here say criticism of former President Donald Trump's debate showing is overblown.
MARIA ELENA CONWAY, REGISTERED REPUBLICAN: It was three against one.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): And won't matter come November.
CONWAY: I think Trump loves this country and love the people of this country. I think he wants the best for us. He wants to fight.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): But in this critically close state --
MAIGAN KENNEDY, REGISTERED DEMOCRAT: There was nothing in the debate that helped me make the decision that I need.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): Not everyone has made up their mind.
GALLAGHER: You are an undecided voter.
JIBRIL HOUGH, REGISTERED DEMOCRAT: Undecided who is strongly looking towards third party.
GALLAGHER: Did the debate change anything for you?
HOUGH: No, it didn't.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): Jibril Hough says he'll only vote for a candidate who supports an arms embargo on Israel and ceasefire in Gaza.
HOUGH: It's more important than the economy. That's more important than health care, that's more important than so many other things because we have to stop this genocide.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): Others want more specifics.
KENNEDY: There wasn't a lot of policy that was talked about, just kind of like aimless plans and vibes honestly.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): Naomi Hernandez Hall, registered Republican who voted for Trump in 2020, has not been swayed by Harris but remains frustrated by the former president.
NAOMI HERNANDEZ HALL, REGISTERED REPUBLICAN: And I was just really just disappointed because he hasn't shown and proven himself like he did with the first campaign.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): Especially on reproductive rights.
HALL: He kind of deflected on it. He didn't really speak on it like I wanted him to. When kept asking if the bill came to his desk, would he be told or would he ban it?
GALLAGHER (voice-over): With 50 plus days to decide, Hall says she is going to take her time.
HALL: I'm going to continue to look to see what they're going to say for the next couple of weeks to kind of weigh it out.
GALLAGHER: Undecided voters like those truly could make a difference here in North Carolina, where polling shows that Trump and Harris are virtually tied. Both campaigns have already spent millions of dollars here with millions more in ad reservations through the election. It is no coincidence that the first post debate stop for Harris, a pair of rallies right here in North Carolina where every vote truly does count.
As a parent, there are still some that are up for grabs.
Diane Gallagher, CNN, back to you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[04:05:00]
FOSTER: Now, TikTok recently announced it's adding resources on voting and how elections work, more than 170 million American users. The popular Chinese platform could possibly be banned in the U.S. as soon as January over national security concerns.
But TikTok is still attracting a growing number of users, including young voters who say they use the app to keep up to date with politics. CNN's Donie O'Sullivan reports on that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: What's your most viewed video?
NESA E., TIKTOK CREATOR, @RIGHT.ALWAYS.WINS: Born in Iran, raised in Iran, but more patriot than those who vote blue with the Trump flag in my office.
HARRIS: You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?
MARIANNA PECORA, COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, @VOTERSOFTOMORROW: That was a couple days ago in the airport on my way here to Atlanta.
Donald Trump is the biggest, most existential threat to Gen Z's future.
O'SULLIVAN (voice-over): Nearly all TikTok users said in a survey that they use the app because it's entertaining. But more than a third said they also use it to keep up with politics.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Listen to this rant that Donald Trump just went on.
PECORA: It's been a really fun time to be on the internet.
O'SULLIVAN (voice-over): So I met with two Gen Z TikTokers to talk about how and why they make political videos.
NESA E.: You guys want to know what's worse than a liberal? Despite what some people refuse to believe.
O'SULLIVAN: Right.
Donald Trump is receiving so much support from people that are young, kind of like my age.
Right.
NESA E.: Despite what some people refuse to believe, Donald Trump is receiving so much support from people that are young, like, kind of like my age.
O'SULLIVAN: Right.
O'SULLIVAN (voice-over): Nesa is an Iranian immigrant who's amassed thousands of followers with her pro-Trump TikToks, many of which show off this MAGA store in Forest Lake, Minnesota.
NESA E.: You will get compliments from most people on social media as long as you support their opinions. And I believe the algorithm also plays a huge part, specifically on TikTok.
NESA E.: God bless you. I followed you. Facts.
O'SULLIVAN: You know when you're posting this stuff that it's going to start a debate?
NESA E.: Yes. O'SULLIVAN: And that's kind of the point?
NESA E.: Kind of. Yes. I believe I'm providing a space for Republicans and Democrats to have debates.
O'SULLIVAN: What are you seeing on your feed?
NESA E.: I mostly see Trump stuff.
I went to the same high school as Barron Trump. I'm going to save this to watch it later.
PECORA: Sure, you might have been seeing online engagement for Donald Trump, but that's because young people are really, really scared of it.
O'SULLIVAN (voice-over): Marianna Pecora works with Voters of Tomorrow, a nonprofit focused on getting Gen Z to the polls.
PECORA: Quick take, what's your least favorite thing in Project 2025?
O'SULLIVAN (voice-over): Marianna is a big fan of Vice President Harris.
O'SULLIVAN: You edited this?
PECORA: This one I had some help from one of our younger volunteers.
O'SULLIVAN: Right.
PECORA: We were specifically trying to reach, like, a younger Gen Z, almost Gen Alpha leaning audience with that.
PECORA: We've been talking about what Congress can do to support young people. Congressman Bowman, what you got?
PECORA: At this point just about every member of Congress has either, like, a Facebook page or an Instagram or a Twitter. Not all of them are on TikTok, and I think that's OK.
O'SULLIVAN: Yes.
PECORA: They, like, not --
O'SULLIVAN: Not everybody --
PECORA: -- not everybody is suited for it, but I think it's really important and exciting that there's a lot of young people working in politics that are focused specifically on content creation right now.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hey, North Carolina Democrats, we just got done --
PECORA: The best messenger for a member of Gen Z is another member of Gen Z. O'SULLIVAN: And yes, what's really interesting there is you can see just how different the content you get is depending on your politics, depending on what the algorithm thinks you want to see. You can get two very different experiences, two very different types of streams of videos coming at you every day. Back to you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: As his presidency in life and politics winds down, President Joe Biden continues to cement a legacy that's nearly half a century in the making. On Thursday, Biden marked the 30th anniversary of the Violence Against Women Act at the White House. Then-Senator Biden helped shepherd the landmark legislation in 1990, a moment he holds near and dear to his heart.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The Violence Against Women Act is my proudest legislative accomplishment in all the years I've served as Senator, Vice President, and President. I mean that from the bottom of my heart.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: A former CIA officer has been sentenced to a decade in prison for spying for the Chinese government. According to his plea agreement, Alexander Ma arranged for himself and a relative to meet with a Chinese security officer or officers in Hong Kong and hand over classified material in exchange for $50,000. Ma pleaded guilty in May.
He became the target of an undercover operation after applying to work as a linguist at the FBI field office in Hawaii. The U.S. Justice Department says the bureau hired Ma to work at an off-site location where his activities could be monitored. He allegedly took a digital camera into the office to photograph sensitive documents that he planned to give to his Chinese handler.
Now we're getting a rare look inside North Korea's nuclear program. The reclusive nation has released images of leader Kim Jong-un touring a uranium enrichment facility. State media says the site is used to produce weapons-grade material for Pyongyang's growing arsenal.
[04:10:02]
Kim pledged to exponentially expand his nuclear inventory during a speech on Monday, celebrating the country's founding. CNN's Mike Valerio has more from Seoul, South Korea.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MIKE VALERIO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, when we speak to experts on North Korea and we ask the all-important question, why does this matter? And why should we be paying attention to this? They come back and they say, this certainly could tie directly into the U.S. presidential election, with Kim Jong-un trying to telegraph beyond his borders that both of the presidential candidates should certainly not, from his point of view, forget about him or forget about North Korea.
So when we look at these images, you know, we are accustomed to seeing pictures of North Korean nuclear equipment looking like something you would see out of the old Soviet Union. But again, with these images that are new, extremely difficult to verify coming from North Korea, we see what appear to be row after row of gleaming centrifuge. Gleaming centrifuges, which are used as the primary machinery to refine and weaponize, enrich, I should say, weaponize uranium to be used in nuclear devices.
So again, nuclear and North Korea experts are saying this could be Kim Jong-un trying to say North Korea is nuclear and it's not going back to a time when it wasn't.
Now, earlier this week here in the Seoul region, I had the opportunity to speak to former President Trump's fourth National Security Advisor, Robert O'Brien. And I asked O'Brien, would there ever be a chance of the United States agreeing to a nuclear freeze with North Korea?
Saying that it has nuclear weapons, but no more nuclear weapons for the North. He said that would be extremely tough. Listen to his comments.
ROBERT O'BRIEN, FORMER U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: To excuse the North Koreans and say, OK, it's OK for North Korea to have a bomb. It's pretty hard then to say, well, no, Iran can't have a bomb and Saudi Arabia can't have a bomb to deter Iran. It can't just be that the bad guys can hit the bomb with impunity.
VALERIO: North Korea is acting with more confidence. Who could forget earlier in the summer when Russian President Vladimir Putin came to the North Korean capital to officially enter into a new military strategic partnership.
One of the questions moving forward though, is whether or not these images are a potential, and I stress potential, prelude to a nuclear test from North Korea before the U.S. election.
A nuclear test from North Korea has not happened since September of 2017. And with a country as elusive as North Korea, no one can know for sure.
Mike Valerio, CNN, Seoul.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: We continue to monitor the latest out of the Democratic Republic of Congo, where a military court is due to deliver a possible death sentence for 50 defendants charged with an alleged coup attempt. That's coming up.
[04:15:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: Fifty people, including three Americans, could be sentenced to death today in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The military court is expected to deliver its verdict over what the Congolese army says was a coup attempt.
The botched coup, led by a little-known opposition figure, Christian Malanga, targeted the presidential palace and a close ally of the president. Malanga was fatally shot during the incident in May, but his son, a U.S. citizen, and two other Americans are amongst those implicated. CNN's Victoria Rubadiri, who's following all these developments live for us, from Nairobi in Kenya. What have we learned about what they were trying to attempt here?
VICTORIA RUBADIRI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right, Max. Throughout the proceedings of this particular case that began back in June, hasn't been entirely clear what the motive is, whether Christian Malanga, as you mentioned, acted alone, whether there was a hidden hand in government, for instance.
But what the defendants have revealed in the hearings is they put full blame on Christian Malanga when it comes to the planning of the incident. They said he threatened them to either join the cause or be killed.
But of course, the bigger question today, Max, is whether those defendants will indeed be sentenced to death. When it came to March this year, the death penalty actually was reinstated in DRC Congo.
Now, this is after a moratorium over 20 years was lifted. And of course, we saw in July and August of this year, several individuals have already been sentenced to death. Now, the proceedings won't be taking place for another hour or two.
And so we'll see whether those sentencings back in July and August are anything to go by for these defendants.
FOSTER: What, if anything, have we heard from American authorities on this? Because clearly, American citizens were involved.
RUBADIRI: Absolutely. Immediately after that botched coup attempt, we saw the DRC-based U.S. consulate, of course, say they will cooperate with any investigations. And of course, trying to see how they can aid in trying to get more information on those particular American nationals who have been named in this particular case.
But so far, that's all that they have given in terms of assistance -- Max.
FOSTER: OK, Victoria, we'll stay with you on that. Fascinating. Thank you.
A scary moment in the NFL on Thursday night as the Miami Dolphins quarterback suffers yet another concussion on the field. What we know about his condition next.
[04:20:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JARED ISAACMAN, POLARIS DAWN MISSION COMMANDER: Back at home, we all have a lot of work to do, but from here, I'm going to tell you the truth. That sure looks like a perfect world.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: The four civilian astronauts on the SpaceX Polaris Dawn mission made history with their spacewalk. Two went out of the craft and two stayed in the capsule, but all four were depressurized and exposed to the vacuum of space. A milestone in an historic and potentially dangerous maneuver.
The mission has set records and took the crew further into space than any human since NASA's Apollo program more than 50 years ago now. The capsule is expected to return to Earth this weekend, possibly Sunday morning Eastern time.
Now to the NFL, where there's growing concern about the well-being of Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa after he suffered yet another concussion on the field. It happened on Thursday night in Miami's loss to the visiting Buffalo Bills. The 26-year-old took a hit to the head by Bill's safety, Damar Hamlin, and stayed on the ground. He eventually walked off the field on his own though.
He suffered multiple concussions during the 2022 season, and he said last year he considered walking away from the sport. The Dolphins head coach says Tua is, as he's known, is in good spirits and the next step is a proper medical evaluation. A big debate in that sport about head injuries as it is in other sports around the world right now.
U.S. College Sports is in for another realignment with the Pac-12 adding six more schools. The conference currently has only two members, Oregon State and Washington State, but effective July of 2026, four schools from the Mountain West Conference will join. They are Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State and San Diego State.
And stories in the spotlight this hour. A runaway penguin lost at sea off Japan for two weeks is now safe. The penguin, named Pen, was suing the staff from a travelling zoo when she escaped since the feathered fugitive was born in captivity and had been in open water, so chances of survival were pretty dim. But then typhoon Shanshan hit. A zookeeper tells CNN that probably helped her stay alive, keeping her cool and hydrated and safe from boats and fishing nets.
Pen was found on Sunday eight miles from where she went missing, so storms can be good news for wildlife. Now, well, you know, captive wildlife.
[04:25:00]
A New York City art show hopes to promote harmony between man and animal. A hundred wooden elephant figures have been popping up in New York's trendy meatpacking district. It's part of an art installation titled The Great Elephant Migration. The organizer says the sculptures are crafted by Indigenous artists from southern India and are based on real wild elephants from the coffee plantations there.
Spectators are invited to touch the elephant sculptures, which range in size from baby to adult. The pieces are also for sale if you have the cash, with proceeds going to conservation groups, so it's going to a good place at least.
Now, imagine finding a Lego that's been stuck in your nose for nearly three decades. That's exactly what happened to Andy Norton, who shoved a Lego piece in their nose as a child and didn't realize it was still there.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDY NORTON, FOUND LEGO PIECE IN NOSE: I was a kid playing with my Legos, as most children in the 90s did, and I had the greatest idea to take one of those little dot Legos and, I don't know, I just thought maybe I could just stick it in my nose.
I was going to stick the Lego man up my nose and try to connect the piece on the top of the head, like a little hat. The Lego head popped off in my nose.
At this point, I've panicked loudly and my mum came in. So she grabs a pair of tweezers and she, you know, tilts my head back. She fishes out this Lego head.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Unbelievable. 26 years later, after dealing with breathing issues, a doctor told Norton to blow their nose in the shower. That's when this Lego piece came out. Norton says they don't know what to think, but hopefully they can breathe a little easier now.
Thanks for joining me here on CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Max Foster in London, CNN, "THIS MORNING" after a short break.
