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Biden Admin Expected To Unveil New Evidence Of Russian State Media Network Key Role In Russian Intelligence Operations Globally; Harris Campaign Looking To Keep Momentum Up Following Debate; Putin Warns West Against "Direct Involvement" In Ukraine. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired September 13, 2024 - 11:00   ET

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

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[11:01:13]

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington and you're in the CNN Newsroom. We begin with breaking news this hour, a CNN exclusive. The Biden administration expected to unveil new evidence of a Russian state media network's key role in the Kremlin's global intelligence and influence operations. CNN national security correspondent Kylie Atwood is joining us from the state Department right now. What are you learning, Kylie?

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN U.S. SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, what we've learned, Wolf, is today the Biden administration, as you said, is going to reveal RT, that Russian state media network as playing a critical role, a key role in Russia's intelligence gathering and operations globally around the world. This is according to a senior administration official and multiple sources familiar with the matter.

What the State Department is going to do is they are going to declassify U.S. intelligence based on RT activities globally that make this case that RT is fully integrated into Russia's intelligence operations around the world. They're also going to do something else. They're going to launch a global diplomatic campaign so that U.S. diplomats are informing their counterparts in other countries of the risks associated with RT. We're expected to learn some very new details about what exactly Russian intelligence has been doing with RT.

For example, embedding a Russian cyber unit into RT at one time, that's according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. And we should note that this builds off of the Biden administration's focus on Russian intelligence gathering, Russian disinformation globally.

Just last week, we saw the Biden administration, the Department of Justice, go after what RT is doing here in the United States to try and undermine, to try and influence the 2024 presidential elections. And what they're going to do today is make the case that this isn't just happening here in the United States, but this is a problem around the world.

And I think it's important to note, that this also is just weeks before the U.N. General assembly. Later this month, we're going to see world leaders at the United Nations. And the senior administration official tells me that they're going to try and use that gathering of world leaders to actually create momentum for going after, for targeting RT and making sure that people who are seeing what they are putting out know that it is tied to Russian intelligence operations. Wolf?

BLITZER: A significant development indeed. Kylie Atwood of the State Department, thank you.

I want to turn right now to the 2024 presidential race here in the United States. For now, Donald Trump appears to have settled the debate over the future issue of debates, saying he will not face Vice President Kamala Harris for a second round of debates. The Vice President saying the offer is still on the table, though, and the ball is in his court. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I believe we owe it to have another debate, right? We owe it to the voters.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Because we've done two debates and because they were successful, there will be no third debate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: While Trump claims he was the clear winner Tuesday night in that first debate with the Vice President, polls consistently show that viewers thought Kamala Harris came out on top by a wide margin. Today, she's looking to continue that momentum with campaign events in Pennsylvania while the former president continues his post-debate cleanup with what he says will be a press conference in Las Vegas. Let's see -- see if he actually answers reporters' questions.

For more on all the latest developments within the Harris campaign, I want to bring in our senior White House reporter, Kevin Liptak. He's here with me in the newsroom. So, Kevin, how does the Harris campaign plan to keep the momentum going following up on the debate?

[11:05:00]

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yes, I think if you could describe the next phase of the campaign for Kamala Harris, it would be the grinded out phase. They really want to get her in the battleground states, not only in front of voters at big rallies, but kind of among the voters at these retail stops. And you'll see her do that in Pennsylvania today. And it's interesting. She's traveling to two counties in Pennsylvania that Donald Trump actually won in 2020.

And they do make the point that they want to get her among voters, and she's going to look for votes anywhere she possibly can in Pennsylvania. And I think if you're looking for any further sign that Pennsylvania is a linchpin of her strategy, just look at her calendar for the last eight days. She has spent seven of those days all are part of them in Pennsylvania. So this is a very critical state. We're going to see her first in Johnstown. She's going to be visiting a local business with John Fetterman, the Pennsylvania senator. That's kind of where they want her. They want her talking to people. They think that puts her in a good light, puts her sort of among the people she needs to be talking to. Then it's onward to a big rally in Wilkes- Barre, sort of the, kind of the traditional big rallies that we've been seeing her doing.

So I think this is a very important moment for her. Last night, we did find out that the campaign raised $47 million in the -- in the 24 hours after that debate. That was from 600,000 individual donors. But with the big fundraising, with the momentum, obviously also comes the concerns among the campaign about overconfidence, and they are very much trying to guard against that. They say they're still the underdogs in this race.

BLITZER: Both campaigns, I take it, believe that if they win Pennsylvania, they'll win the election.

LIPTAK: Very much so. I think what you hear from the Kamala Harris side, though, is that they're trying to locate other paths to 270. Certainly the polls in Pennsylvania show a very close race. But yesterday it was interesting. She was in North Carolina. That's a state that Democrats had more or less written off when Joe Biden was the nominee. Now they believe it is still very much competitive for them. And so in addition to the so called blue wall, you are going to start to see Kamala Harris really try and focus on these multiple pathways to get to 270.

BLITZER: Kevin Liptak, thanks for the reporting. Appreciate it very much.

Also today, vice presidential nominee, Tim Walz, is out there on the campaign trail in Wisconsin. A new poll shows his running mate, Kamala Harris, the presidential nominee with a four point lead over former President Trump in that key battleground state of Wisconsin. And next week, Wisconsin will start mailing ballots to voters right away.

Joining us now is the state's Republican Party chairman, Brian Schimming. Brian, thanks so much for joining us. Give us your sense. What are you hearing from Wisconsin voters today following this first debate?

BRIAN SCHIMMING, WISCONSIN REPUBLICAN PARTY CHAIRMAN: Yes, I've been traveling the state. It's -- the reaction actually has been very, very good. And I will tell you this. The almost comical focus on the debate and what the debate supposedly did or did not do is not really holding up in most of the polling that I'm seeing here in Wisconsin. Secondly, how ironic that -- that -- that Vice President Harris should be talking about Donald Trump answering questions when she's done virtually no interviews for weeks on end. Two months she's gone with almost no interviews whatsoever. And suddenly she's the authority on Donald Trump answering questions. It literally comical.

BLITZER: She did a substantive interview with her own Dana Bash on CNN, as you well know. SCHIMMING: Yes, she did. Well, it was nice that she did one interview. I appreciate that. One interview in 60 days. One substantive interview in 60 days, quite an accomplishment for somebody who's been Vice President for almost four years. But we would think that we want more out of candidates than that.

And the truth of the matter, Wolf, is that, frankly, had "ABC" followed the rules and the format that CNN did, we probably would have had a more interesting debate. But the truth of the matter is whether Donald Trump debates or not isn't really the question. The question at hand here, and you see it in the CNN polling as well, is the Democrats are upside down on inflation, on the economy, on the border, on violent crime.

The problem for Kamala Harris is she can't afford to answer those questions because if the Harris campaign is tied to the last four years of Joe Biden, she will lose the election and the Democrats know it.

BLITZER: Well, were you surprised that Trump decided no more debates? He wasn't going to do a second round of debates with Kamala Harris? He won't participate in any future debates with her. Why not?

SCHIMMING: Yes, I'd be fine if he did debate with her. But if -- but even if he doesn't, and there was a ways to go, but presuming that he doesn't, all I'm -- all I'm saying is that Donald Trump is out in public answering questions all the time and she is not. Where are all the people that claim they want to hear answers from the candidates when it comes to Kamala Harris basically doing a Joe Biden basement strategy since before the Democratic convention? So if we want to talk about transparency, if we want to talk about candidates and where their positions really are, she's the one who's hiding, not Donald Trump.

[11:10:08]

BLITZER: Do you have a problem at all that Trump only does interviews with friendly reporters who support him and they only ask a bunch of softball questions?

SCHIMMING: Well, first of all, that's not always -- always the case, and -- and especially vis-a-vis, Kamala Harris, who -- who most people might say that she gets softball questions to the extent that she's had to answer any whatsoever. But look, Donald Trump's out there. I mean, kind of one of the interesting things about this, Wolf, is here's Donald Trump, pretty well known commodity. Let's face it. I think that's something that Democrats and Republicans can agree on, that people know who Donald Trump are -- the -- pro -- pro -- Donald Trump is.

The problem in this election is we don't, Kamala Harris doesn't want us to know who she is. If you take her by the record, not only her record as vice president, but in the United States Senate as the most liberal person to the left of Bernie Sanders in the U.S. Senate, she wants to run away from all that. So she has to concentrate all the fire on Donald Trump. So, you know, as I say, it's -- in -- in a sense, it's a race between two incumbencies, the four years of Donald Trump and the almost four years of Harris and -- and Joe Biden. When you stack it up that way, Kamala Harris loses.

BLITZER: Brian, you remember a few weeks ago, all those reports that Trump had called Milwaukee. You think about Wisconsin. You, of course, think about Milwaukee. He called Milwaukee a horrible city, as you will know. How much of a problem has that been for -- for Trump in your state?

SCHIMMING: You know how much, Wolf? Zero. I'm around Milwaukee. I'm in Milwaukee every week. I've had an office there for, on and off for years. So I don't, you know, I don't hear that. I didn't even hear it during the convention. And you and I and others were down there for days on end. You know, I don't hear that in the places I go in Milwaukee and I go all over the city, north side, south side, downtown, east, west. I didn't hear that at all.

What people are talking about is what they're having to pay at the grocery store and at the gas pump and things like that. I think sometimes all the political folks who watch all this stuff are so close to it that they forget what the voters are really thinking about. They're thinking -- I think it was Ron Klain, knowledgeable guy, Joe Biden's first chief of staff said, look, the problem with gas prices like that, or it's the only thing you buy that you're reminded of several times a day.

Well, that's the situation with grocery store prices as well. People are reminded once or twice a week how prices and inflation are out of control of the last four years, over 20 percent cumulative. That's what people are worried about, not some aside from Donald Trump.

BLITZER: This week, there were numbers that were encouraging. I will say this. I was in Milwaukee for the Republican convention, and the city did an excellent job of organization. I thought it was very well --

SCHIMMING: Yes. They're really done.

BLITZER: -- indeed. All right, Brian Schimming, thanks so much for joining us. We'll continue this conversation down the road.

Also this afternoon, President Biden will meet with the British Prime Minister Keir Starmer over at the White House. They will discuss allowing Ukraine potentially to use long range weapons provided by the U.S. and other western NATO allies deep into Russian territory. President Biden has been facing increasing bipartisan pressure to try to loosen the restrictions and is signaling a new openness. The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, is delivering a rather chilling warning just ahead of today's meeting.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VLADIMIR PUTIN, RUSSIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): This is their direct involvement. And this, of course, would in a significant way change the very essence, the very nature of the conflict. It will mean that NATO countries, the United States and European countries are at war with Russia.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Basically saying it would be an act of war. Our chief national security correspondent Alex Marquardt is here with me in the CNN Newsroom. This would be a major shift if the Biden administration and other NATO allies allowed to these longer range missiles to be used, that -- that the -- the NATO allies are providing to Ukraine to be used against Russian targets deeper inside Russia.

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: It -- It would, and that's why we're hearing that ra -- that reaction from Vladimir Putin. We are talking about the longest range U.S. missile that the U.S. has given to Ukraine. It's called an ATACMS. It goes around 200 miles or 300 kilometers. And the Ukrainians have essentially been begging the U.S. to be allowed to use it.

At the same time, they're also asking the Brits to use an equivalent missile called a Storm Shadow. That's why it's both the British and the Americans who have to come to this decision. Now, we could see a possibility in which the U.S. says we don't want the Ukrainians to use the ATACMS, but Brits, go ahead, you guys can use, or the Ukrainians can -- can use the Storm Shadows. But this would -- this would change the battlefield, Wolf.

Now, to be clear, the U.S. has already given Ukraine permission to fire across the border with shorter range missiles. But this is again, the -- the longest range missile that we have seen the U.S. give to Ukraine so far. So we have seen this openness from both President Biden and his secretary of state, who has been in the region. He was in Kyiv just a couple days ago. Secretary Blinken saying, as the battlefield changes, so too does U.S. policy evolve. This is language that we've heard in the past.

[11:15:17]

So there is a good chance that the U.S. does allow this to happen. But what is the effect? There is the risk of escalation, which is really what President Biden is -- is certainly afraid of. I mean we hear that -- that threat from -- from President Putin. There is a question of supply. This -- there's not an infinite supply of these ATACMS. They're quite precious.

And the U.S. thinks that they could be put to better use inside of Ukraine in those Russian occupied areas in Crimea, for example. And then there's also the question of how much of an impact will they actually have once they're inside Russia. Now in recent weeks, Ukrainian officials have come here to Washington to make their case. They presented a list of targets.

I spoke with the Ukrainian defense minister who said that that included airfields. Now that very well may be, but U.S. officials also point to the fact that some of those Russian targets may be moved out of range. And so at the end of the day, those ATACMS may not actually be all that effective. But if the U.S. and Britain do give Ukraine that permission, it would certainly send a strong message. Wolf?

BLITZER: And Putin is suggesting that potentially could be an act of war?

MARQUARDT: Yes. And -- and this is something that we have heard from him before. Frankly, not much would change except the range on these missiles because these missiles, shorter range missiles are already being fired inside of Russia. But President Biden is coming under significant pressure from his own camp, from senators like Jeanne Shaheen and Ben Cardin, both of whom are on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. They would like to see the U.S. to -- to loosen those restrictions even if it didn't have a major military impact, it would certainly send that message about U.S. support for Ukraine, which may be a victory in and of itself for Ukraine.

BLITZER: Very tense moment right now in this war that's going on. Alex Marquardt, thank you very much.

Still ahead this hour, we are standing by for a major records release from emergency officials in Georgia, the 911 calls from last week's school shooting in Winder. CNN is also learning new details about how the 14-year-old gunman concealed that long AR-15 rifle when he actually entered the school that morning. We'll have a live report and a lot more, that's coming up next.

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[11:22:04]

BLITZER: And we're following some breaking news. There you see Justin Timberlake just arriving in court out on Long island in Suffolk County. He's expected to change his plea related to his drunk driving arrest. The singer was arrested back in June after police initially pulled him over for running a stop sign and not remaining in his lane. We'll go live to our correspondent outside the courthouse later this hour. Stand by for that. He's expected to plead guilty to driving while impaired. That's a lesser charge than while driving while intoxicated. We'll watch all of this unfold.

Elsewhere, there's other news we're following, including in Georgia right now. We're just getting some new details that are emerging in last week's deadly rampage at the Apalachee High School. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation has released new information about the moments that led up to the shots, when the shots rang out, including how the 14-year-old shooter hid his AR-15 style rifle that day and walked into the school.

Joining us now is CNN senior national correspondent Ryan Young. He's got new reporting. What are you learning, Ryan?

RYAN YOUNG, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, there's a lot of details about this that have parents sort of upset about what happened in the steps that led up to this shooting. What we do know is that accused shooter did enter a school bus to get to school that day and he had the gun concealed in his backpack. And apparently he didn't even break the gun down. He had it sort of tucked under his arm. We also know he missed several days of school, maybe nine days before the shooting happened. He excused himself, went to the bathroom, and when he went to the bathroom, he came back with that gun exposed. This matches up with all the people who've talked to us so far about him being at the door, trying to get back into that classroom with that gun exposed before he started shooting.

We've also figured out from the GBI that he had a knife with him as well. And we don't believe that knife was used in the attack at all because he used that gun to start firing over and over. This has been devastating for this community. Take a listen to the principal put out a message just two days ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JESSICA REHBERG, PRINCIPAL, APALACHEE HIGH SCHOOL: I know we all have so many feelings we are trying to process, including how do we carry on. I focus on you. Getting to see so many of you on Sunday night and Monday afternoon was uplifting, strengthening and healing. Our students and staff are truly the best. You are the most important part of Chi Nation. You make us who we are. You are loved. You are needed. Thank you for taking the hard steps to walk back on campus.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

YOUNG: Yes, Wolf, this has been tough, but some of the victims feel like they're being victimized again. And I can tell you the GBI and the FBI is actually putting warnings out for students and people around the community to stop making false calls into schools. And that's something that's been happening over and over. It's something they want to see stopped. Several arrests have been made since then. Wolf?

BLITZER: All right, Ryan Young, we'll stay in close touch with you. Thank you very much.

[11:24:54]

Still ahead this hour, in her voting era, we knew that Taylor Swift's 283 million Instagram followers would click on pretty much any link she posted. But just how much is her endorsement of Kamala Harris actually driving more young people to come and vote? The stunning new numbers we're just getting that's coming up.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: So because we've done two debates and because they were successful, there will be no third debate. It's too late anyway. The voting's already begun, yet. You got to go out and vote.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[11:30:04]

BLITZER: Fresh off a bruising 90-minute debate showdown where former President Trump repeatedly --