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Israeli Airstrikes Pound Beirut's Southern Suburbs; Special Counsel: Trump Said "So What?" To Pence In Danger On January 6; Today: Liz Cheney To Campaign With Harris In Wisconsin. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired October 03, 2024 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:35]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: It is 8:00 p.m. in London, 3:00 p.m. in Washington, D.C., 10:00 p.m. here in Tel Aviv.

I'm Jim Sciutto. Thanks so much for joining me today on CNN NEWSROOM. And let's get right to the news.

Another deadly day in the Middle East as Israel continues to strike throughout Lebanon. The IDF says it killed several Hezbollah commanders in the last three hours after strikes hit southern Lebanon. Earlier in the day, an Israeli airstrike further north and central Beirut killed nine people. This is the first time Israel has struck in that area of central Beirut since its war with Hezbollah back in 2006, 18 years ago.

Israel's attacks have killed more than 1,000 people while they have also displaced a million residents since this war escalated. Humanitarian agencies are saying they are now operating beyond capacity. Amidst all this, Israel has not slowed down the war in Gaza. Israeli airstrikes killed 99 people in Gaza in the last 24 hours, you could see some of the aftermath there.

Our Ben Wedeman is in Beirut, Nic Robertson here with me in Tel Aviv.

Ben, first, describe this series of strikes in central Beirut. They were taking place throughout what I imagine was a daunting afternoon there.

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, that strike that happened in Central Beirut, Jim, happened during the night, that was a single strike. Most of the strikes today have been on the southern suburbs. In fact, just a few minutes ago, we heard a distance thud, hearing and seeing on the Lebanese media that it may have been a strike near Beirut's international airport. It continues to function despite all of this, the national carrier Middle East Airlines is still flying in and out, putting on additional seats for people who want to leave Lebanon at the moment, and there are many.

One of the strikes claimed by Israel they said it's one of -- it's on one of Hezbollah's intelligent intelligence headquarters. Now, I know the building they struck. To the best of my knowledge, that is where Hezbollah's media office its located. However, there was nobody in the office at the time. So these things are always hard to get to the bottom of, you get claims from Israel, counterclaims from Hezbollah, but yes, it continued strikes in Beirut, intense strikes on the south as battles rage down there.

Hezbollah puts out hour by updates on what its fighters on the border are doing. It appears that they've been busy targeting Israeli soldiers, gathered on the other side of the border preparing probably for entry into Lebanon. My count says that at least 17 strikes on Israeli troops so far on the other side of the border.

And what we're also seeing, of course, what appears to be Israel lane plans for a broader invasion. At this point, Israel has given evacuation orders to 76 villages in south Lebanon. So, that would certainly indicate much broader plans than what we've heard from the Israelis, talking about localized, limited, and targeted raids inside Lebanon. This would suggest something much more.

Of course, people here have been watching since the last October, Israel's military actions in Gaza. The fear is that Israel is going to come in, destroy everything and nobody knows when if they'll ever be able to go home and if they will have homes to go back to -- Jim.

SCIUTTO: Ben Wedeman, thank you.

Nic with me here.

We learn today from the IDF that a ninth Israel soldier was killed in southern Lebanon. That follows quite a deadly day yesterday, 24 hours when it eight were killed. I mean, to Ben's point there, one, it's already quite clear this is dangerous ground and we knew this from -- from 18 years ago. Is it your sense that Israel is expanding the scope of this operation there?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: It's certainly preparing the ability to do, and one of the things that these messages for the civilians living in the south to leave your homes and never come back or are not come back until the IDF tells you that its safe to, which does rather sound like a lot of what we've heard in Gaza with civilians totally their homes there and many of them are still out of their homes, are not necessarily safe.

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But it does tend to indicate that Israel wants to deny Hezbollah the ability to hide among the population. This is the narrative from the IDF, that Hezbollah hides among the population. This is why they are civilians to evacuate neighborhoods in Beirut, evacuate certain buildings because they go to target Hezbollah in those areas.

Here, it's a much tougher proposition. But if you remove the civilian population, then it looks more like a sterile battlefield are the only people moving in that battle space would therefore be your enemy and you can more readily identify them and target them. Does it mean they're going to put troops there?

It's not clear at this stage, but, you know, there was one thing that I looked at today that happened on the border, the IDF chief of staff, General Herzi Halevi, went there and he said it already looked at an investigation into why so many troops died and another 47 injured yesterday and he said what he saw and this was thinking this in terms of morale boosting speech, officers leading from the front when they went into combat. And that's the way the IDF fights.

So he's really a stirrings, is not talking about okay, boys, we're going to -- girls, we're going to back down. He's basically saying this is how we fight this is what were going to do going forward. So that intent to keep going, trying to figure out how far is really present.

SCIUTTO: Well, listen, if it does follow a similar pattern to what we saw in Gaza, of course, the difference is Lebanon's much larger, larger population, larger area, which would seem to presume more strikes, more and more force presence, et cetera.

Nic Robertson, thanks so much. Of course, our Ben Wedeman as well in Beirut.

Well, as Israel weighs the other big question, and that is its response to Iran's unprecedented ballistic missile attack on Tuesday, President Joe Biden in his public comments seems to be leaving the door open, at least to Israel striking Iran's oil facilities

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPORTER: Would you support Israel striking Iran's oil facility, sir?

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're in discussion of that. I think -- I think that would be a little -- anyway.

REPORTER: Is the plan to allow Israel to strike back against Iran?

BIDEN: First of all, we don't allow Israel. We advise Israel. And there's nothing going to happen today. We'll talk about that later.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: CNN's Kylie Atwood is at the State Department.

And, Kylie, listen to those terms -- those words there of the president wasn't quite clear what he was trying to communicate. It seems like he -- he said something and caught himself, pulled back. I mean, is it your sense from speaking to U.S. officials that striking oil facilities is something that the U.S. might get on board for? Because the president has been quite clear that he would not support an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities.

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: That's right. So the president is actually the one who has been the clearest in public about what the U.S. would support and what they wouldn't.

Even when you talk to U.S. officials, Jim, they're very reticent to give you details in terms of what the U.S. is saying to Israel about what their response should look like. An attack on Iran, which U.S. officials say is justified, would be severe. They're not being particular killer about the advice that they're giving them about the contours of what that strike should look like.

The president himself, as you said there, keeping the door open to the possibility of Iran going after -- or excuse me, Israel going after Iran's nuclear facilities. And that is noteworthy. He did seem to catch him himself there before he went any further into that possibility. But when you contrast it to the very clear answer that he gave yesterday when he was asked if the U.S. would support Israel going after Iran's nuclear program. And he simply said, no, and he called for Israel to respond in a way that was more equivalent to what they saw, it's -- it's striking and what it tells you is that the U.S. is giving them potentially some room when it comes to going after Iran's oil reserve.

It's also very clear at this moment in time, Jim, when you talk to U.S. officials publicly in terms of what they're saying, in terms of what they're saying privately and publicly that the United States is not putting diplomacy and the need for a diplomatic outcome front and center this week. Because of the incredible attack that was carried out by Iran earlier this week, because of the continued back and forth along on the northern border, the United States is saying they still want a diplomatic outcome, but they're certainly not focused on those conversations this week. They're really focused on how Israel is going to respond.

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And the State Department for their matter is saying that they do want to see Hezbollah further degraded.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, there doesn't seem to be any substantive ceasefire negotiation at this point. Kylie Atwood, thanks so much.

Well, here to discuss Israel's options going forward in its war with Hezbollah is Miri Eisin. She's a retired IDF colonel, and now director of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at Reichman University.

Thanks so much to have you. Good to have you here.

MIRI EISEN, DIRECTOR, INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR COUNTER-TERRORISM, REICHMAN UNIVERSITY: So, thank you so much for being here.

SCIUTTO: So there's a public discussion right now of Israel's options here, which you're familiar with, could it be the nuclear sites, oil facilities Iranian leadership.

I wonder, is that an accurate presentation of how Israel is approaching this, that it has this kind of range from -- from one more extreme end to something less extreme for instance, not striking nuclear facilities? Is that a correct way to be looking at this?

EISEN: Israel has been looking at those nuclear facilities for many years. This is not something new. I think already almost a decade ago, this has been a real challenge for us. And when you have a challenge, you tried to prepare yourself.

SCIUTTO: Right.

EISEN: So that's certainly something that's going to be on the table. Israel is fighting a multi-front war. While this has going on, as you know, we've been attacking all the different Hezbollah sites inside Lebanon. We continue to attack against different sites Hamas in the Gaza Strip. And as we're talking, there are other proxies that have been attacking. I've heard of other attacks inside Sria and other places.

SCIUTTO: Uh-huh.

EISEN: So when you go out to do something like that, you have to also understand both the limits of your own force and the capabilities.

SCIUTTO: There is an -- there is a understanding that Israel could not decisively strike Iran's nuclear facilities without U.S. military support? Is that accurate? Could it do it on its own and might that depend on the extent of its objective in terms of those nuclear sites?

EISEN: I wouldn't want Israel to do it on its own. That doesn't mean that we don't have the capability. Those are two different things.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

EISEN: Israel is not a world power. We're certainly a regional power.

At the end of the day, Iran going nuclear, Iran attacking Israel the way that it has. This has not just a problem of Israel, it's a problem way beyond that.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

EISEN: And in that sense, what I would like to see is certainly something that's done not just in coordination, but in cooperation, and not just with the United States.

I really do think that this threat is something that we're belittling. Can you imagine what's going on right now if Iran was nuclear?

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

EISEN: It's a totally different world.

SCIUTTO: No question.

EISEN: So I would like to hope to see it that way, but we do have the ability.

SCIUTTO: Would the Israeli leadership move forward, as you know, there's been some differences between U.S. and Israeli leadership over the course of the war for the last several months. If the U.S. were to say no, might Israel go forward over U.S. objection?

Even if it prefers us participation or cooperation or approval, if you didn't get it, might it make its own decision to do so? EISEN: Jim, we're sitting here right now in Tel Aviv. That's what the backdrop is behind. I think that you view things differently when you're here.

When it's an existential threat, you do things also on your own. Did anybody in the world expect Israel to be the one to defend off and its own way, Hamas without colossal failure at the beginning? Hezbollah, which is a problem not just for Israel, but much further than that for us to go against both the Houthis in Yemen and other sites. Here we are taking care of all of these different Islamic regime of Iran's proxies.

And so now that big question is, will Israel go at it alone? I don't want to, but that is an existential threat. And it's not just Hezbollah or Hamas, it's also Iran.

SCIUTTO: Is it possible that Israel might carry out military action and the world wouldn't know against sensitive Iranian sites? Iran might know, but perhaps Iran wouldn't want to advertise that.

EISEN: Well, that would be the sort of thing that we'll be able to talk afterwards and see what comes out. I think it's easier to do something covert again, as a country like Iran, which at the end of the gate today is an Islamic regime, it's a dictatorship. If you do something there that they don't want anybody to know, perhaps they could keep it under wraps.

SCIUTTO: Right.

EISEN: There is an opposition. Things do out -- come out at the end. That's also by the way something that you can do, which lowers the tones. You do something, they know it. You know it when you don't necessarily get to an open flash (ph).

SCIUTTO: Let's talk now about operations against Hezbollah in Lebanon, because they're clearly expanding the number of airstrikes we saw just today in Beirut, but also ground operations and those ground operations have already proven deadly. And I was here in 2006 and there are some echoes in my own mind of how deadly that operation was with an uncertain outcome.

Can you describe Israel's objective in Lebanon? Now it does it intend to push Hezbollah all the way back to the Litani River? And if need be occupied that area?

EISEN: We never want to occupy Lebanon, even when we occupied it in those 18 years, it's not like we sat there in the military presence.

What Israel wants to do right now is I would say continue what has been put on in the last 48 hours is that the IDF over 200 days was acting in that southern Lebanese area, right adjacent to the border to expose and go into the underground, subterranean arena, which has tunnels just like under the Gaza Strip, and also into the town sounds and villages where Hezbollah built a force like the Nukhba, Hamas October 7 attack.

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And they had all of the cache of weapons, the subterranean. They were going in to take care of that. There's a lot of footage about that.

What the IDF is doing now is getting to the places that you can't just get to in that very covert operations that were taking place over the last several months and I think in that sense, when we talk about limited in scope, limited in time, limited in the capabilities you built your force to be able to respond. But right now what they're doing is against those Hezbollah, mainly the Radwan forces that are right along the border?

SCIUTTO: Before we go, there's an enormous amount of anticipation now about Israel's next step. And I'm not going to hold you to this. And, of course, decisions being made outside of our own purview. But do you expect and Israeli response to the Iranian attack in the next several days?

EISEN: I expect an Israeli response. I cannot say what will be the next several days. We're in the middle of the Jewish New Year.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

EISEN: And I say that, but that's also people are in synagogues and otherwise. When you attack something, you cannot always know how they're going to the respond. That's going to be part of the idea.

I absolutely think that we will do something. Don't know if it will be overt or covert. But when we do so, I do think that people will know.

SCIUTTO: All right. Miri Eisen, thanks so much for coming on. We appreciate your analysis.

EISEN: Thank you so much.

SCIUTTO: And we will be right back with more live from here in Tel Aviv, on the war between Israel and Hezbollah. And more broadly, in this region.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: Welcome back. We return our -- to our coverage of the expanding war in this region, including Israel's new strikes inside Lebanon. Today, hitting Central Beirut, targeting the IDF says the intelligence headquarters of Hezbollah.

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This comes as Israel's also weighing a response to Iran's barrage of missiles fired at Israel, including here in Tel Aviv on Tuesday night.

Joining me now, retired U.S. Army Colonel Peter Mansoor. He was a former aide to General David Petraeus during the Iraq war. He's currently a senior fellow at the Mershon Center for International Security Studies.

Good to have you back, sir. Thanks so much for joining.

COL. PETER MANSOOR (RET.), FORMER AIDE TO GENERAL DAVID PETRAEUS: Thanks for having me on, Jim.

SCIUTTO: What Israel's U.N. ambassador has told CNN that the response to Iran's ballistic missile attack will be soon. And you heard my conversation just a few moments ago with Miri Eisin describing the outlines -- well, one, clear, a clear commitment from Israel to strike back against Iran, but also holding open the possibility of quite an extensive attack.

And I wonder, what do you expect? And how far do you expect Israel to go in its response against Iran?

MANSOOR: Well, Israel wants to re-establish deterrence over Iran. I think Israeli leaders were okay with the response in April after those attacks that was quite limited. They took the U.S. advice into account. But this time, they're not going to listen to the Biden administration and go the diplomatic route. They don't want Iranian missile attacks on Israel to become a habit, to become somehow normal.

And so this is going to be, I believe, a very significant response may be targeting the Iranian oil industry to say, you tried to hurt us, we will hurt you.

SCIUTTO: President Biden, as you know, made clear he would not support an Israeli attack on nuclear sites. His comments seemed to open the door, leads to a discussion of attacks on Iran's oil -- oil facilities.

But that, of course, would have potentially enormous economic consequences. I mean, we're seeing the price of oil already go up just based on that prospect. Can you explain how that might reverberate out an attack on oil facilities?

MANSOOR: Well, clearly, we'll have a global economic impact. I'm not sure how extensive Iranian oil has been embargoed before. And the world is lived with higher oil prices. So it will have an impact.

But I don't think Israeli leaders are taking that into account. What they want to do is hit around hard enough that Iranian leader know they cannot continue these missile attacks against Israel. And if they strike back after the next Israeli strike, then all -- all bets are off nuclear program might be the next target.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, well, it's one of those vicious cycles of attack and retaliation. You and I spoke Monday about the Lebanon -- the ground invasion of Lebanon by Israel and what that might look like.

Based on what you've seen so far, this initial push across the border, which has already been quite deadly, nine Israeli soldiers killed, but also now in expanding air campaign right up to the central areas of Beirut. Is this still a limited operation in your view?

MANSOOR: It is somewhat limited by I think what we're seeing is that the Israelis have really taken into account the lessons of the 2006 war against Hezbollah when they went in with conventional forces that weren't really very well trained. I had a lot of reservists in the ranks and they got hammered by Hezbollah on the ground and this time they are much more skillfully applying their combat power to the areas that they're going into southern Lebanon.

And as a result, yes, they've taken some casualties. That's inevitable in war, but this is a much more successful operation so far than the 2006 campaign. So I can -- I think we're going to go see this continue for weeks.

SCIUTTO: And air warfare expert has told you it ended its aerial campaign, Israel's air campaign in Lebanon is being conducted now in an intensity comparable only to the first weeks of its bombardment of Gaza. And of course, we've seen the enormous destruction in Gaza, as well as the enormous civilian casualties there.

Is that what Lebanon, in your view should brace itself for including parts of Beirut for that level of destruction like we've seen in Gaza?

MANSOOR: I don't think Israel's interested in leveling Beirut that I think they're heading. They're targeting their Hezbollah leadership and command and control facilities. But they really want to do is eliminate Hezbollah's missile caches, and their military facilities. Most of those are south of the Litani River. And those will be hit hard.

Some reports have them being reduced already by 50 percent, which would be amazing accomplishment in such a short period of time.

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SCIUTTO: Before we go, I have to say, having been out in this region for more than 20-some odd years, that the -- the sense I get from Israeli leaders, even members of the Israeli public, but even some of Israel's -- Israel's supporters in the U.S. about strike Iran now, now is the time and, hey, there may be an opportunity now to take out Iran's nuclear facilities, no reason to hold back, that it feels familiar to me to those -- those months in early 2003 before the U.S. went into Iraq. And of course we know what followed there.

Do you worry, given your own experience that Israel might overestimate its capabilities and underestimate the risk of this getting out of its own control?

MANSOOR: I do. I mean, Israel is being very successful in a military sense in both Gaza and Lebanon, they're sort of feeling like they're winning this conflict and I think they do have a sense that now's the time to strike. We have the upper hand, we have the capabilities and if not, now, when? And so, let's go in and take out the nuclear facilities.

But that will only lead to a war with Iran, a state-on-state conflict. Iran isn't just going to fold and give up.

SCIUTTO: Yeah. MANSOOR: And so, that would mean sort of a 2003 moment where you strike the facilities, declare mission accomplished, but oops, now what?

SCIUTTO: Yeah, now what? Burning question.

Peter Mansoor, thanks so much.

SCIUTTO: Thanks, Jim.

Coming up the most, the most vivid picture of special counsel Jack Smith's January 6 case against Donald Trump. What we are learning from the now unsealed presidential immunity case filing?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

Donald Trump's actions on and in the lead up to January 6 are back in the political spotlight today.

Former Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney, who led the House January 6 investigation lost her seat after criticizing -- opposing Trump, is campaigning with Vice President Kamala Harris next hour in Wisconsin. Trump's former aide, Cassidy Hutchison, who you may remember, testified before Cheney's committee, has now officially endorsed Harris and all that follows a major legal filing unsealed last night in the D.C. federal court. The most comprehensive look so far its special counsel, Jack Smith's case against Trump and evidence against Trump for his actions on January 6, and in attempts to overturn the election and how Smith envisions prosecuting Trump. This all following the Supreme Courts broad immunity ruling.

I want to break down what we learned in that filing with Tim Heaphy. He's a former federal prosecutor, worked as a lead investigator on that House January 6 Committee.

Tim, thanks so much for joining.

TIM HEAPHY, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Jim, thanks for having me.

SCIUTTO: So as we mentioned, you are part of the House committee that spent months investigating Trump's role in January 6. Yet, there are new details here. I want to read just one of them. This from a conversation between Trump prompt and an unnamed aide, quote, upon receiving a phone call, alerting him that Pence had been taken to a secure location. The aide rushed to the dining room to inform Trump in hopes that he would take action to ensure Pence's safety. Instead, Trump looked at him and said, only "So what?"

So what? That's the words of a sitting president in the midst of a violent attack on the Capitol about his sitting vice president. Legally, how important is that new detail and others you saw/ HEAPHY: Yeah. Some new details, first of all, they just corroborate the core story that the select committee told. The skeleton and the core narrative of this multi-part intentional plan to disrupt the joint session was laid out by the committee, but there are important new -- there is new flesh on those bones and new details.

A lot of them, Jim, go directly to the former president's intent comments like, so what when he is told that Mike Pence is being evacuated because of the capital, his lack of concern, it's almost as if he welcomed it almost as if he acknowledges that he somehow caused it. That's powerful evidence of his state of mind, which will be a central element of Jack Smith's proofs.

So, the pleading is full of little anecdotes like that direct communications by the president that are windows into his state of mind.

SCIUTTO: Of course, they submitted this filing following that Supreme Court ruling, that some of Trumps conduct could be considered official, therefore, immune from prosecution.

Smith says in this filing, and I'm quoting again here, the defendant acted as a candidate when he pursued multiple criminal means to disrupt through fraud and deceit, the government function by which votes are collected and counted, a function in which the defendant as president had no official role in reading this.

Do you believe -- believe jack Smith has effectively altered his case to fit under that Supreme Court ruling?

HEAPHY: Yes, I do. Look, I believed way before the immunity case, just based on the work of the committee that there is clear evidence of criminal conduct and that that conduct was well outside the bounds of the official duties of the president.

Justice Barrett, if you remember, in her concurrence in the immunity case, explicitly made this very point that there are times when a president act as a candidate or the leader of a party in those things are personal, are private outside of the scope of the court's immunity.

And that's essentially what Jack Smith has done. He has laid out his facts of great detail and may pretty strong arguments that those acts are done by the defendant, a former president, in his capacity as a candidate, not in his capacity as president.

I think it's pretty compelling. It'll ultimately be up to Judge Chutkan. And then again, the Supreme Court to decide if that's accurate.

SCIUTTO: But despite this evidence now being out there, Trump's legal future are very much now in the hands of voters. If Trump wins, you almost certainly would have is DOJ just dismiss this case. If he loses, it will go forward, but yet again, we'll get another hearing I imagine that the Supreme Court. Four years later, is it a failure of our justice system that it took this long for a case like this, even to make it not to trial, right, but to a step or a few steps before trial?

[15:30:03]

HEAPHY: Yeah. I don't know that I'd go as far as to call it a failure. I think its disappointing that it is four years, almost four years later, and these serious allegations have not been adjudicated.

I think there are a lot of reasons for that. I think the Department of Justice was a bit slow footed in pursuing this. They were very focused on the violence at the Capitol as they would be, and perhaps were a little bit reluctant until the select committee showed some of our evidence to pursue this sort of political angle.

I'll give him credit though for moving quickly once they focused on those allegations. Jack Smith has been extremely aggressive, has gotten beyond where we were by getting through some executive privilege assertions using the tools that he has in the grand jury process. So while they were late, they have aggressively pursued it appropriately, aggressively proceeded it then.

SCIUTTO: Tim Heaphy, thanks so much for helping us break it all down.

HEAPHY: My pleasure, Jim. Thanks.

Well, this new January 6 filing is just the latest October surprise with the potential to sway the seemingly extremely close presidential race. There's also a widening war, of course, here in the Middle East that could, depending on Israel's response spike oil prices. That would, of course, mean a spike in the cost of gas in the U.S.

Plus, you have a deadly catastrophic hurricane in two key swing states, North Carolina and Georgia. Could these major stories, one of them or all of them breaking as early voting has begun, tip this race?

CNN senior political analyst Ron Brownstein joins me now to discuss.

Ron, it's good to have you here.

I wonder, when you look at these collection of events here, do you see the collection of them or any of them individually as potentially being decisive are pushing this race one way or the other?

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I mean, the reality, Jim, I'm kind of thread that runs through all of this is that we're down to only six or seven swing-states, 40 states have voted the same way in at least the past four elections but, those six or seven swing states are now incredibly, narrowly balance so that you can kind of point your finger at anything and say it could be the tipping point.

I do think that both campaigns think that these -- if the -- if these states are going to tilt a little one-way here, the other from where they are now, it's less going to be because of the last 4 or 5 percent of people who are certain to vote but uncertain who they're going to vote for, that the bigger prize, the bigger game is which side can turn out more of the people that are pretty likely to vote for them, but uncertain whether they're going to vote in the first place. And those tend to be people who are less affected by immediate events and often pretty, you know, kind disconnected from them.

SCIUTTO: So, who has the advantage then in the turnout race?

BROWNSTEIN: Well, I think if you look at it right now, Vice President Harris, I think has a slight advantage in the three former blue wall states. That combined with Omaha, after the effort to change the allocation system in Nebraska failed, would take her to 270.

I mean, Democrats have since Trump won those states in 2016, Democrats that were restored and advantage and they owe the governorship in all three, they all five of the six Senate seats, Biden won them all. They've won three legislative chamber in them.

And they have more of a conventional get out the vote operations. Trump is outsourced at largely to Charlie Kirk, and Elon Musk and we'll see whether they can find these younger Black voters, man in particular, who are indicating in polls that they are more open to Trump than in the past.

I give Harris a slight advantage in those states, but you seeing Trump is pounding away at them around one argument above all, Harris cannot take on immigration and crime, ending that it, blue collar voters, especially women, but in those days, I think that's the critical, kind of pivotal of a battle that is underway between now and November, because there's the support she now among blue collar white women in those three states.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, I feel like we should start calling them the blue curtain states, maybe not quite the blue wall seems movable.

BROWNSTEIN: Yeah.

SCIUTTO: I wonder, given this January 6 filing and all the details in there, and frankly, damning evidence against Trump, plus helping to remind voters you have former congresswoman, Republican Liz Cheney, joining Harris on the trail today in Wisconsin, does January 6 move undecided voters? Does having Republicans warning of the danger of Trump move undecided voters in your view?

BROWNSTEIN: I think the answer is yes and yes, but not to the exclusion of everything else.

[15:40:02]

I mean, I wrote a year ago, maybe more, that in many ways, if you're thinking about how the -- how the election has changed since the last time, since 2020, it's inflation and immigration benefiting Trump, and abortion and insurrection benefiting the Democrats. I mean, you know, the fact that voters say they trust Trump more on the economy than Harris as they did on Biden, even though that's narrowing -- ordinarily, that would be the candidate who has the advantage. I mean, you go back from American history, the candidate whose

favorite on the economy usually wins. Trump does not realizing the full extent of that advantage because there are so many voters who view him as a threat to their rights, their values, and to democracy itself. So yes, it's not an absolute get out of jail free card for Democrats to overcome the concerns about inflation and immigration.

But there's no doubt that if you look at polling, particularly in the swing states there are voters who by historic standards would be leaning to Trump, who are still holding back primarily because of these issues of rights and freedoms. And what do means potentially for American democracy.

Liz Cheney is important you know, Trump is very strong with blue collar voters. Democrats have offset that by winning more center right white-collar suburban voters who used to vote Republican and are now obviously resisting Trump. Cheney is a permission structure for those voters.

SCIUTTO: Well. Now those are consider abortion rights, they have fellow supporter in the presidents, the former president's own wife, Melania Trump, based on revelations in her memoir.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes, yeah.

SCIUTTO: Ron Brownstein, thanks so much.

BROWNSTEIN: Thanks for having me.

SCIUTTO: After the break, and this is history -- this is a story I want to stick around for. I'm going to be joined by the husband of one of seven people killed in a terror attack here in Tel Aviv just on Tuesday. Please do stay with us.

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[15:45:02]

SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

On Tuesday, while Israel was under siege from some 200 Iranian ballistic missiles, two men carried out a terror attack at a light rail station in the Jaffa neighborhood of Tel Aviv.

Seven people were killed, among them, Inbar Segev-Vigder, a 30-year- old fitness instructor, and mother, to a nine month old baby boy. Inbar was carrying her young son, Ari, in a baby carrier when she was attacked at close range inside a light rail car. Shielded by his mother, Ari survived, she did not. Hamas has now claimed responsibility for the attack.

Joining me now is Inbar's husband, Yeari Vigder.

Yeari, I truly appreciate you joining and my heart goes out to you and your family.

YEARI VIGDER, WIFE WAS KILLED IN THE TERROR ATTACK IN JAFFA: Thank you so much. Thanks.

SCIUTTO: I wonder if you could begin by telling us about your late wife.

VIGDER: Inbar was the sun of my life. She was the most the most beautiful woman that I knew. She was the most caring mother that anyone, especially Ari could ask. She was everything. She was everything for us. We loved her so much. And we still are.

SCIUTTO: She has -- seeing the pictures here had a great smile. Can you walk us through what happened on that evening?

VIGDER: Yeah. So I was at work and Inbar was in the vet and our dog didn't feel. And she just go with the train.

Back home from the vet with Ari, our son, in the carrier, in the train after she breastfed him, she wanted to go out in our station, next to our home, just got shot from close range from the terrorist. She and our beloved dog (INAUDIBLE) she got out from an operation. She's fine right now.

And I -- when I just heard about for my side -- when I just heard about this -- the situation, I took my bike. I was at work. I took my bike and ran into the scene. Inbar didn't answer my calls.

So I just I looked forward everywhere. I found our dog Kapara (ph) in the scene, got shot and so much so that -- not -- the nicest people just took her and give the medical treatment that she needed.

I just -- I knew that my mission is to find my family and I just went house to house shouting to -- involve a shouting if someone saw a mother with a baby boy, with the carrier and while the missiles in the air. So I hear the alarms. I saw the missiles and just keep going and going.

I -- yeah. I am (INAUDIBLE) found Ari there, that got a medical treatment. Ari has no scratch on his body. It's amazing. It gets a little. A little miracle in this whole story and I didn't find Inbar until the police came and told me about this terrible -- terrible thing, yeah.

SCIUTTO: I'm sorry to make you have to remember. I'm sure walking through all those moments has to be painful for you.

Tell us about the relief when you -- when you found out that your son Ari at least was safe.

VIGDER: Yes. So, it was quite a journey because when I got to the hospital, I needed to go to the children department in the hospital and to find her and no one there because the missile attack, they went to the safe house, safe room.

So I found them and Ari was in down the stairs in the safe room, so I didn't see him first and when I saw him, it carried by one of the doctors in the hospital, was such a relief, but I understood that my mission didn't end and I need to find my wife and to know that she's got the medical treatment that she needed

We didn't know where is she until the police came.

SCIUTTO: Well, Yeari, we're so sorry you went through this. We appreciate you sharing your story and we want you to know that everyone here at CNN, our thoughts are with you and your family

VIGDER: Thank you. Thank you so much.

SCIUTTO: Our thoughts do go out with him. We'll be right back with more.

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SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

On the very top of the world, a new superpower has entered the Arctic Ocean. China's coast guard claims to have sent vessels into the Arctic for the first time. The move comes as part of a joint patrol with Russia in the latest sign of enhanced coordination between the two countries, and in a part of the world increasingly seen as both strategically and commercially important as the ice cap melts.

Analysts say the new patrols designed to send a signal to Washington whose maritime activities in the South and East China Seas have long irked Beijing.

CNN's Marc Stewart has more from Beijing.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARC STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Four years, the Arctic Ocean has been a point of interest for China amid its strong ties with Russia. While this patrol, if it did indeed enter the ocean, may have just been on the outskirts. The messaging and images from the Chinese government show the symbolism and importance of the region to China.

Let me show you some of the pictures we've received. We see a shot from above of the Chinese coast guard vessel. There's a helicopter taking off flying around. Officers are singing the national anthem on deck along with some ceremonial moments.

An officer from the Chinese coast guard said this voyage is about security.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): The arrival of China's coast guard vessel formation in the Arctic Ocean demonstrates the CCP has the ability to safeguard international maritime security. China actively fulfills international obligations, participates in global maritime governance, and shows an image of a responsible major country. Meanwhile, it's also showcasing his professional abilities in maritime law or enforcement.

STEWART: Analysts point out this is a broader pattern of collaboration and designed to send a message to Washington whose maritime activities in the South and East China Seas have annoyed Beijing. A retired U.S. Navy captain who has worked in intelligence feels this presence in the far north is significant because it implies China is extending its coast guard into areas the U.S. has traditionally considered to be its own domain.

The U.S. has raised concerns about Chinas presence in the region and its coordination with Russia, as we see, the two nations tightened their security and economic ties on broader level.

No official response from the Russian government, although state media did publish a report on the patrol.

Marc Stewart, CNN, Beijing.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: Thanks so much for joining me today. I'm Jim Sciutto reporting from Tel Aviv.

"QUEST MEANS BUSINESS" is up next.