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Mayor Of Lebanese City Among Those Killed In Israeli Airstrikes; Sources: U.S. Expects Israel To Strike Iran Before Nov. 5; Kamala Harris To Rally With Republicans In Pennsylvania; Zelenskyy Presents His "Victory Plan" To End Russia's War; FAA Auditing Collusion Risks At 45 Major U.S. Airports. Aired 3-4p ET
Aired October 16, 2024 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[15:01:03]
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: It's 8:00 p.m. in London, 10:00 p.m. in Beirut, 3:00 p.m. here in Washington.
I'm Jim Sciutto. Thanks so much for joining me today on CNN NEWSROOM.
And let's get right to the news.
Intentionally targeted -- the Lebanese prime minister has a strong accusation he's making against Israel, this after an Israeli attack on a municipal building in southern Lebanon. State media say it killed the mayor of Nabatiyeh. Lebanese officials say strikes in the city killed at least 16 people in total. The IDF says it struck dozens of Hezbollah targets there today, claims it was targeting underground infrastructure used by Hezbollah.
Israel also pounded the southern suburbs of Beirut for the first time in several days. According to Lebanese authorities, their country has now seen more than 10,000 Israeli strikes.
CNN's Jeremy Diamond is tracking the crisis in the Middle East. He joins us now from Jerusalem.
Jeremy, tell us what we know about this Israeli strike on that municipal building in southern Lebanon in terms of who was there and who were some of the civilian victims apparently caught up in this.
JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, the Israeli military says that they carried out multiple airstrikes on the city of Nabatiyeh. One of those at least striking the municipal building in the heart of that city killing at least 16 people altogether, including the city's mayor who was killed in this attack. These really military is claiming that they were striking an underground Hezbollah facility belonging to Hezbollah's elite Radwan force, accusing Hezbollah of using civilians in that area as human shields.
But the -- but the -- forgive me, I'm just getting some feedback here but the Israeli military is making that claim. But, Lebanon's prime minister is accusing the Israeli government of intentionally striking this building at a time when government officials were holding a meeting about emergency relief efforts. The Israeli military hasn't responded directly to that claim, but, of course, we have seen over the course of the last two months is we have seen, intensifying airstrikes in southern Lebanon, but also, of course in the Lebanese capital of Beirut, in the Dahieh, the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital.
We have seen as so many of these strikes have not only targeted Hezbollah posts, Hezbollah underground facilities, but have also of course, resulted in the deaths of hundreds of civilians, including hundreds of women and children all together over the course of the last couple of months. So this is a situation that is continuing to escalate.
And even though there seemed to have been an understanding over the course of the last five days or so that Israel would no longer be striking Beirut, at least not for the time being and understanding between the U.S. and the Israeli governments on that, last night, the Israeli military did indeed carry out yet another airstrike in Beirut. The first in nearly a week now, but showing that they very much are continuing to do so and that they are going to continue to carry out strikes anywhere in Lebanon that they deem necessary, Jim.
SCIUTTO: Jeremy Diamond in Jerusalem, thank you.
Well, U.S. officials in Washington anxiously awaiting the scale, the scope, the target of Israel's counter attack on around. Right now, the expectation is that retaliatory attack will take place before the U.S. election, little under three weeks time.
What exactly it looks like? Still not clear.
Joining us now to discuss, our White House correspondent Arlette Saenz.
And clearly, they've been in touch, the U.S. and Israeli officials, and quite close touch as Israel has pondered its next strike. Is -- is it clear that Israeli officials are sharing what their targets will be or is it more likely they're keeping this as general as they can?
ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, the U.S. certainly is trying to maintain this constant contact with Israeli officials to try to ascertain exactly what their next steps will be.
[15:05:04]
The administration has long stressed that they expect that there will be a response and President Biden, when he spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, just last week, did not try to dissuade Netanyahu in any way from having a response. But what officials at this moment are trying to do is ensure that any response will be proportional or measured.
One thing that sources have told us that Netanyahu assured Biden on in that phone call last week, is that he would not be targeting oil or nuclear facilities tied to Iran. That is a relief to the administration as President Biden publicly had spoken out against either one of those potential targets, but it does come as they're still trying to ascertain exactly what Israel will do, whether they will target a military facilities, whether there might be a covert operation. The U.S. administration is trying to stay in contact to try to help them ascertain and determine those next steps.
Now, it's always been acquitted question, not whether if Israel would retaliate against Iran, but when they would decide to do so. And the current understanding among administrative are U.S. officials, according to sources that have spoken to our colleagues, is that they do believe that this response will come before the November election.
Now, Israel has been debating how exactly to proceed for the past two weeks and sources say that its not the times necessarily or having any -- trying to have any impact around the election. But they do believe that Netanyahu is highly attuned to any political ramifications that a response against Iran could have in U.S. politics. It all so comes as the U.S. is trying to determine, not just what Israel will do, but also how Iran might respond after any such retaliation.
Now, it does come at a time when this conflict in Gaza, the conflict in the Middle East has become a real political flashpoint in this campaign. It is something that dogged Biden he was running for president and it continues to be an issue for Vice President Kamala Harris.
There are sizable groups among young voters, Arab American and Muslim American voters who are very frustrated with the administration's approach to this conflict. That could really be pivotal in a state like Michigan, which has a very significant Arab American and Muslim American community where really just a few thousand votes could make the difference in what could be an incredibly tight race.
So the possibility of Israel responding to Iran in the final days of the election does a potentially thrust that right into voters minds as they are preparing to go to the ballot box.
SCIUTTO: Arlette Saenz, thanks so much.
Well, Israel has assured the U.S. that in the strike on Iran, as we said, will be limited to military targets, not the nuclear program, for instance, or oil facilities.
Joining me now to discuss is Behnam Ben Taleblu, he's a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
Thanks so much for joining.
BEHNAM BEN TALEBLU, SENIOR FELLOW, FOUNDATION FOR DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES: Pleasure.
SCIUTTO: So it appears the U.S. and Israel have come to agreement not to strike nuclear facilities, which the U.S. was concerned would escalate this to something more broad. Oil facilities, which sounds like the U.S. is concerned would lead to a spike in oil prices. But that something will happen before Election Day.
I wonder is election day at all relevant in your view to the Israeli prime ministers calculus here, or is he going to strike when he deems Israel ready?
TALEBLU: Well, I certainly think there is a political rationale or political element to the delay thus far between the Iranian strike in the much anticipated Israeli retaliation. But I would be remiss to say that there aren't other factors here. There are legal factors, of course, most importantly, strategic factors, is this going to be a one-off like is this just an operation versus a larger campaign?
And also military, what kind of size is a direct retaliation to the places that launched against Israel on October 1st. Is to go after a capability to handicap the long range strike capabilities? There's all these military and political questions that every time you turn the issue is kind of like a kaleidoscope turns and looks fundamentally differently.
SCIUTTO: Now in terms of military targets, of course, one could go after ballistic missiles that targeted Israel now twice this year. And I was there for one of them recently.
But there's also the possibility that one might lay the groundwork for further strikes. For instance, if Israel were to go after surface to air missiles around nuclear installations, right? Make a subsequent attack if that were decided upon easier for Israeli forces.
TALEBLU: Exactly. And that could be also one of these reasons for the delays that, is this a disarming or a defanging type of operation to pave the way to even be able to credibly threaten the use of force without ever actually having to use force down the line. This could also bolster, by the way, U.S. attempts to engage in coercive diplomacy with the Iranians and say, hey, look, your nuclear facilities are unguarded. You better make a nuclear deal with us in good faith. And this is something that could actually help either Democratic or Republican administrations down the line.
SCIUTTO: You often hear this, you know, reestablishing deterrence language, or this even escalate to deescalate languages as each side has been trading quite dangerous blows, right, in the past several months here. In your view, does either side in this want to deescalate?
TALEBLU: I don't see a clear definition of political or military victory articulated by the leadership on either side, just yet, but I do see a willingness by the leadership on both sides, on both Israel and Iran to be able to try to exploit the middle. And that's why this theory of escalate to de-escalate has really been put forward by both sides. They want a new Middle East, but they wanted, at least on their terms, and it just so happens to be that the primary tool to make this new Middle East on both sides is apparently going to be military force.
SCIUTTO: I want to ask about Lebanon now, because what were seeing take place there in terms of the scale of the airstrikes, but also now rising civilian toll while not the equivalent of what we've seen in terms of scale or concentration to Gaza, it has some similarities when you have this strike for instance in Lebanon taking place while a meeting according to Lebanese officials was taking place in that building.
And I know that Israel saying there was Hezbollah infrastructure below but if you're striking while the, while there are civilians there, including the mayor, is Israel getting -- I hate the phrase collateral damage because we're talking about human beings here, but is Israel, again, showing insufficient attention to civilian casualties in southern Lebanon.
TALEBLU: It depends on if there were -- it depends or not if there was a knock or at least a warning distributionally, the kind of thing that predates any kind of Israeli overt aerial strike. It remains to be seen if this was the case when it comes to this building with some of the suburbs in south Beirut. But I think largely the goal is to find a way to handicap Hezbollah at any cost. And that means --
SCIUTTO: Any costs, even humans civilian costs?
TALEBLU: Well, I think unfortunately, human civilian costs are part of the equation. I think Israel has done far and away better than most countries if you had been confronted with a multi-front, multi-domain threat -- land, sea, air, five or six different borders conventional asymmetric. And one that has states sponsorship, but for some reason that state sponsor has gotten away scot-free, literally killing Israeli civilians since October 7.
SCIUTTO: I get that. Listen, I know the threat and I've certainly experienced a threat on the ground there myself and I've talked to victims of this threat going back to October 7 and beyond. But the question is, of course, more is expected of Israel because Israel is a liberal democracy there and it has the U.S. as its ally and --
TALEBLU: And I would say indeed more has been seen of Israel than any other actor had -- who had been, who would be in that space.
SCIUTTO: Well, there is -- you'll admit disagreement. There's even been criticism from U.S. officials, right up to the president, president, President Biden, that Israel has shown insufficient concern to civilians in Gaza.
TALEBLU: Certainly over north Gaza.
SCIUTTO: In Gaza for sure. So my question is, is, is what we're seeing in Lebanon right now by Israeli forces, does that show that that pressure doesn't work, or that the decision has been made -- that Israeli officials made the decision that listen we're comfortable with this level of civilian casualties?
TALEBLU: I don't know if the Israeli leadership is comfortable with that level of civilian casualties. Both the military and political establishment to the best of my view, are doing everything they can to minimize it and should be doing more as the war unfolds. But I think the war will be unfolding. That's why I do the consensus between the military and the political establishment, meaning that which we see in Lebanon is really just one phase I think of a much larger campaign.
I do see a real philosophical change in the way Israel sees the threat environment around it since October 7 and they have gone from problem managing to problem solving.
SCIUTTO: Behnam Ben Taleblu, thanks so much for joining.
TALEBLU: Thank you.
SCIUTTO: We are keeping track of the candidates, of course, back here in the U.S., on the U.S. presidential race. Still ahead, Vice President Kamala Harris expected to speak in a key swing state of Pennsylvania. We will have a preview and the unexpected group of guests who are going to be with her.
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SCIUTTO: Welcome back.
We are expecting to hear Vice President Kamala Harris later this hour. She's campaigning in Pennsylvania, will be joined there, and this is notable, by more than 100 Republicans. They're backing Harris for president and encouraging other Republicans to do the same in voting for her.
Later today, the vice president will then sit down for an interview, notably, with Fox News, home to a lot of Republican viewers.
Joining us now to discuss Harris's campaign, CNN's Priscilla Alvarez.
So I wonder, tell us what the strategy is here.
PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, her focus today is Republicans, and this has been a focus for the Harris campaign for some weeks now, they feel as though there are enough disaffected Republicans that they can make inroads. Remember there's the Nikki Haley voters, especially in Pennsylvania, that's an area where clearly they are trying to seize on as many of those votes as possible.
But there's also symbolism in each of these stops. So for example, today, she's doing it at Washington crossing near where George Washington across with his troops -- cross the Delaware River. And that is part of the message today, which is patriotism essentially, party -- country over party.
That's very similar to the message that she delivered alongside Liz Cheney back in Ripon, Wisconsin, which was the birthplace of the Republican Party. So, as she's making these stops, she's doing so quite intentionally in these locations to broaden her message of not just it being about voting for her, but voting for something that's bigger than her and she will also be joined with Republicans today.
Now, there are risks to the strategy. I have talked to Republican strategist about this as well as Democratic strategists and the risks that you face is that maybe they're more turned off by the message that you're delivering than willing to vote for you as a candidate. That's being Kamala Harris, but certainly they're willing to try and they feel as though within their internal polling that there could be just enough Republicans to get on their column.
SCIUTTO: Do you -- listen, I know they share their internal polling only some degree, but do you get a sense from speaking to them that they feel like they're moving some of those Republican voters in her direction.
ALVAREZ: I think they are. I mean, that's what they say. Of course, we'll know on election day, but Pennsylvania is a crucial state for them, when they're looking at that path. I have to 270 electoral votes. And so certainly in Pennsylvania, where there are a lot of Republican voters, she's spending a lot of time in counties that voted for former President Donald Trump.
So there is clearly an intention here to bring these Republicans on board. Again, there -- nothing will be known until Election Day, but certainly given the Republican primaries, the Nikki Haley voters and then later today bringing that message to Fox News. This is the first time she's done an interview with Fox News. Of course, most of those, if not, all of those who watch Fox News are Republicans.
And so this is -- comes with some risk. Talk to strategists. They say it could go poorly or it could go really well. And the idea here is increase the exposure of the vice president, even to those subsets of voters.
SCIUTTO: She can rightfully say, there were members of Trump's own first administration who say not only should he not be president, but he is unfit for the presidency.
[15:20:00]
Priscilla Alvarez, thanks so much.
So with just a few weeks to go to the election, Donald Trump, he's trying to reach out to women voters. He sat for Fox News town hall with an audience of women. During it, the former president said he intended to ease tough abortion restrictions in certain states.
He also discussed IVF.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT & 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This issue has torn this country apart for 52 years. So we got it back in the states. We have a vote of the people and its working its way through the system. And ultimately, it's going to be the right thing. And IVF, you had mentioned before IVF --
MODERATOR: Let's get this question because I believe that's what this is about.
TRUMP: Oh, I want to talk about IVF.
MODERATOR: You don't hear --
(CROSSTALK) TRUMP: I'm the father of IVF, so I want to hear this question.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCIUTTO: Not clear what he means by father of IVF.
We should point out that if election -- if elected, Trump would not be able to change abortion laws in states. That's, of course a matter of state legislatures.
The dissolution of Roe v. Wade gave all the legal authority to individual states, not the federal government.
Joining us now for more on Trump's campaign, CNN's Steve Contorno in Florida.
Steve, I wonder, tell me, I mean, clearly, clearly Trump -- you could tell where campaigns think they have a deficit, right, based on where they're spending their time at this point, clear feels he has a deficit among women voters. So tell me how he's beyond what we heard last night, how he's trying to do that.
STEVE CONTORNO, CNN REPORTER: Yeah. You could clearly see him straining, continuing to strain to find an answer to the issue of abortion, which is something that has been dogging Republicans ever since the Supreme Court that Donald Trump helped put in place overturned Roe v. Wade. You heard him there say that he -- that this is now back in the states.
He also, though, said that some states have been too tough on the abortion issue and that he feels like that can be potentially addressed if he's elected. And, Jim, he has a chance to address it this November. He is going to be voting in on a ballot in Florida where they have a question that asks, do you want to expand abortion access in a state that now bans abortion at six weeks?
So this is sort of the pretzel and the knot that he has tied himself in on the issue of abortion and why his campaign continues to have to have the events like last night where they are trying to reach out to women voters in the final days of this race here. He also called themselves the father of IVF as you heard in that clip that you played.
His policies and those Supreme Court that he put in place is what is allowing states to test whether or not we want a ban in vitro fertilization. In the Harris campaign responded to that saying, what is he talking about?
SCIUTTO: Let me ask you just very quickly, Trump has been asked how he would vote on that Florida ballot measure. How did he answer that question?
CONTORNO: He both sides it for a hot second.
SCIUTTO: Yeah. CONTORNO: He first said that he thought they went too far in Florida and it seems to suggest that he was going to support the ballot measure, but then very quickly after a massive blowback from conservative groups and anti-abortion groups, he said that he intends to vote against it.
SCIUTTO: All right, just one more thing -- CNN's Daniel Dale fact check Trump from yesterday's Fox town hall. He found, quoting here from the fact check, the Republican presidential nominee made at least 19 false claims in the one-hour event that aired Wednesday morning, most of them debunked earlier in the campaign, but some of them new, notably including an absurd -- absurd claim he's the father of IVF.
Trump's falsehoods included repeat lies on the subject of abortion, immigration, inflation, and national security.
I wonder, has the campaign responded at all to this litany of fact checks?
CONTORNO: Now, Trump -- Trump is not one to ever sort of retrace his steps on these kinds of issues and the campaign is, essentially, and we're going to let Trump be Trump mode. We saw him not only doubled down on a lot of these issues over the last couple of days where he's -- you know, this enemy, the enemy from within is something that despite this massive blowback, he doubled down on that.
And then today, at another town hall that will air later on Univision, he was asked about the -- what happened in Springfield, Ohio, and he doubled down on the idea that the Haitians there are eating, he didn't say pets, he said something else. So, you know, clearly Trump at this stage of the race, at this stage of his political career and his life is not going to apologize or backtrack on anything.
SCIUTTO: We have the record, the public record on that.
Steve Contorno, thanks so much.
All right. Let's go over now to our political panel. Alex Thompson, national political correspondent for "Axios", and Jackie Kucinich, Washington reporter for "The Boston Globe".
Good to have you both.
I mean, listen, I have to begin there because it's just become a fact of Donald Trump's campaign and the very man hill himself, that he lies, he lies repeatedly. And you can fact check him, but he keeps lying, 19 yesterday and a whole series of others on other days.
Jackie Kucinich, does that get into the right-wing information bubble, given that -- given that more and more of this country occupies its own impregnable information bubbles or not?
[15:25:12]
I mean, do Fox viewers just think he's telling the truth? JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I mean, I think he's trying to get -- I don't think the right-wing bubble cares at this point. They believe him as the arbiter of truth. And when he's not telling the truth, they figure it's for a reason. The issue here is he's trying in theory to get beyond the right-wing bubble because he can't just win with the right-wing bubble, he needs to appeal to independence.
In theory, he was going to, that's why he was doing that town hall full of women, even though some of them were actually wearing buttons with his name on them and had to be hats on. I don't know how diverse ideologically that audience was.
That said, he really does they need to add people at this point to their coalition. And for the message he's putting out there isn't really doing that.
SCIUTTO: Alex, this is not the first time right at Donald Trump sat down with Black journalists at that event, he claimed that Kamala Harris turned Black which in a litany of Trump falsehoods and offensive statements almost gets lost in the mix. It's just a few weeks ago, seems like 1 million years ago does this campaign, I know the campaigns reflex position to say it's just Trump being Trump, you're the left-wing media. You don't know what you're talking about.
But when you speak to folks on the Trump campaign, is there any sense of -- well, you know, he's not really doing what we need to do to get these swing groups?
ALEX THOMPSON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Let's first just, have a lot of sympathy for Daniel Dale, who I'm sure when he embarked on the fact checking --
KUCINICH: Oh my gosh.
THOMPSON: -- he did not imagine that he would still be doing this so long afterward.
In terms of what the Trump people say, it's really interesting. In many ways, this is the most professionalized campaign Trump has ever had. The 2016 campaign was basically just a really just a rag-tag group of people. They fired three campaign managers.
In 2020, he also fired his campaign manager a few months before election day. And this is the most professionalized. In some ways, it's a professional campaign with an unprofessional candidate attached to it, that is not staying on message, that is repeating lies, that occasionally draw huge backlash and do not focus on the story of the day.
It's part of the reason why the campaign is focused on smaller, non- rally events that keep him closer on message, on policy.
SCIUTTO: Jackie, okay. Let's talk about the other side of the ledger here. You have Kamala Harris attempting to reach her own group of what they believe to be swing voters, which are Trump's skeptical Republicans are never Trump Republican. She's going to be appearing with more than 100 Republicans at this event today in Pennsylvania.
Is it working, right? I mean, do they think in your conversations with the Harris campaign that they're winning over significant numbers of Trump voters who are sorry, rather Republican voters who just don't like Trump?
KUCINICH: So, I mean, it's why they're running critical Bucks County as well, right? And they're trying to create a permission structure which we've heard a lot about this campaign to allow other Republicans to say, you know, it's okay to not vote for this guy. It's okay to vote for her, even if you don't like everything, at least he's not -- she's not him. And that that's why you have and particularly all of these former Trump officials that have come out and said and endorsed her or said, don't vote for him.
So, whether or not that works -- I mean, you know, Jim, we're going to have to see they certainly -- they keep doing it so they must think it's effective. And they keep on rolling out more and more Republicans who have said that they're going to vote for Harris. So it means -- if it wasn't working out, I think they'd be doing that.
SCIUTTO: We should note that several of those Republicans do not say, I just like her policies a bit better, right? I mean, several of them, including folks who served in Trump's last administration, I'm thinking of, say, John Bolton or Mark Esper believed that he is a clear and present danger to this country, right? I mean, that's quite that's in some of Harris campaign ads.
She's going to be sitting down though Alex in an interview with Fox News in a short time later this evening again, part of this, lets reach out to Republicans, Fox Viewers, et cetera. What are the risks in an interview like this one for Harris?
THOMPSON: Well, there were risks that the campaign was not willing to take until a few weeks ago. And that's part of a larger sort of tactical shift you're seeing on the campaign.
You know, I just -- two or three months ago, it was much more focused on joy, hope, freedom. You've seen them turn back towards a more, less joy, more darkness in terms of her messaging, focusing very much on Trump, focusing on the threat he would pose to democracy. That's what these events are about.
[15:30:02]
But also say that Fox News interview is about the fact that Trump has denied her another moment to introduce herself to the American people, but not debating and yet she is trying to find more stage to introduce herself.
SCIUTTO: It's a good point, right? And we should note, I mean, Trump must calculate that there were risks for him, right, in standing across her from the debate stage, once again.
Alex Thompson, Jackie Kucinich, thanks so much to both you.
KUCINICH: Thank you.
SCIUTTO: Well, overseas, Ukraine's president says he has a plan to end Russia's ongoing invasion of his country plus, CNN gets exclusive access to a special Ukrainian unit dealing blows now to the Russian military.
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SCIUTTO: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has presented his victory plan to his country's parliament.
The plan has five points which he says will strengthen Ukraine's position in order to end Russia's ongoing war on the country. And it's hard, as Ukraine's desire to be invited to join NATO. It also outlines provisions to strengthen Ukraine's defense, implement a non-nuclear strategic deterrence package, and also crucially grow Ukraine's economy so wounded by this war.
CNN's Clare Sebastian has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, much of what we now know about Ukraine's victory plan isn't new. A lot of it is really a rebranding of their existing wish lists that if implemented would President Zelenskyy says forced Russia negotiate and strengthen Ukraine's position in those negotiations.
Now, militarily, Ukraine as expected, wants permission to use western long-range missiles on military targets in Russia.
[15:35:02]
It also wants neighboring countries to be able to help shoot down missiles and drones over Ukraine, something Poland, for example, has signaled it might be willing to do and it intends to hold on to some territory inside Russia as a buffer zone.
Well, it also, and this was new, wants to deploy a, quote, comprehensive, non-nuclear strategic deterrent package inside Ukraine without specifying what that would look like.
Now on the political side, the plan makes it very clear that only a concrete invitation to join NATO will prove to Russia that its war goals have failed. Now this plan comes amid criticism of Ukraine, especially in the United States, that its drain on taxpayer funds.
So there's clearly an effort built into the plan to include sweeteners for Western allies, joint investments, for example, in Ukraine's natural resources with a return on that investment. And post-war, Zelenskyy is also proposing that Ukrainian troops could replace some U.S. troops stationed in Europe as part of NATO's defense, making use of their battlefield experience.
Now all of this, of course, still requires Western buy-in and Zelenskyy was pretty open about the challenges of that. VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT through translator): I want to be frank with you on certain behind closed communication with Ukraine. We hear the word talks from our allies much more often than the word justice. Ukraine is open to diplomacy, to the fair one that is why we have the peace formula. It's a guarantee of negotiations without forcing Ukraine to injustice.
Ukrainians deserve a decent peace. The victory plan will pave the way for this.
SEBASTIAN: Well, President Zelenskyy's next stop will be Brussels on Thursday to present the plan to EU leaders.
And as for Russia, was speaking before Zelenskyy's address, the Kremlin dismissed the plan, saying Ukraine needed to quote sober up and realize the futility of the policy they're pursuing.
Clare Sebastian, CNN, London.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCIUTTO: Our thanks to Clare Sebastian there.
Well, inside Ukraine, CNN has been granted exclusive access to one of Kyiv's long long-range drone unit, so crucial to the war. These drones are among Ukraine's most top secret weapons controlled by its most clandestine agency. Their targets are deep inside Russia.
Here's Fred Pleitgen's report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Ukrainian drones attacking southwestern Russia, sowing panic among local residents. Russian air defenses frantically trying to take them down before they slam into their targets. These massive drone strike carried out in late September by Ukraine's defense intelligence agency, the GUR, and they granted CNN unprecedented access to the entire mission. Their target, a Russian ammo depot, the Ukrainian say is storing missiles supplied to Moscow by Iran, even though Tehran vehemently denies giving Russia ballistic missiles.
All of these missions have to move extremely quickly, they have to be very precise because obviously, if they get discovered by the Russians, the Russians want nothing more than to kill everybody around here.
When you're badly outgunned as the Ukrainians, even strategic airstrikes become hit and run operations. The launch location totally secret, the mission run in near complete darkness. We can only identify the unit commander by his call sign :"Vector".
How fast you guys have to be able to do all this now?
"VECTOR", LONG RANGE UAV UNIT, UKRAINIAN DEFENSE INTELLIGENCE: I hope it will be 20, 40 minutes. PLEITGEN: Okay. Tell me how much the Russians want to kill you?
VECTOR: They want very much. Because we are one of the major goals for them, because these UAVs, which are going up to 1,500 to 2,000 kilometers these UAVs move the war inside their country and they're afraid of that.
PLEITGEN: After installing the warheads and punching in the flight path, they push the drones to the takeoff area, the pilots going through final checks.
Then they get the go.
The launch is always one of the most difficult and most sensitive parts of the mission. They have to the follow the UAV very fast with their cars to make sure it gets into the air all right.
The drones disappear quickly into the night sky. The GUR has been behind hundreds of long-range missions into Russia, they say, including this September attack on an ammo depot between Moscow and St. Petersburg, causing massive explosions visible for miles. The Ukrainians believe they hit hundreds of missiles and explosives.
Operational security is extremely important for this team. So we're on our way to the next secret location, right now. They remain on the move almost all the time.
Right now, were going to a place where they're going to do the detailed planning for the flight paths and where we'll see the actual drones.
The weapons depot is about 400 miles from the Ukrainian border in the south western Russian village of Kotluban.
[15:40:04]
A major problem, a mesh of powerful Russian air defenses guarding the area.
How good are the Russian air defenses and how difficult is it to overwhelm them?
VECTOR: Unfortunately, especially last year, it's really good, it's really good. But maybe not perfect because we are successful guys and we find the windows, in these technique.
PLEITGEN: These are the actual strike drones, the Ukrainian-made Antonov AN196 named "Lyutyi", Ukrainian for fierceness or rage.
They carry up to 500 pound warheads and fly around 1,300 miles and they fit into the back of these non-descript trailers, for covert deployment the Ukrainian say they get good results with the Lyutyi drones. But what they really need is permission from the U.S. and its allies to use western supplied longer distance weapons.
So far, the U.S. is not allowing Ukraine to fire American supplied weapons deep into Russia, as Russia has escalated its own aerial attacks against Ukrainian cities and infrastructure using heavy guided glide bombs, cruise missiles designed to take out whole aircraft carrier strike groups, and nuclear capable strategic bombers.
All the Ukrainians have, are their little drones launching them in swarms to even have a chance to penetrate Russia's air defenses.
They blast the Ukrainian folksong, "Hey, Falcons" as the GUR's one birds take to the skies.
Back at base, it's crunch time. Russian social media starts exploding with reports of an attack on the Kotluban weapons depot.
The GUR operatives sometimes chuckling as they listened in.
While the Russians claimed to have shot down the drones, Ukrainian defense intelligence showed CNN the unblurred version of this video, now heavily blurred for operational security reasons. And it shows 11 blasts coming from the same place, they say, so large, they're confident they hit their targets.
CNN was also able to independently verify through a source what seems to be a direct hit on the facility. We're not publishing the image to protect the sources anonymity, but it showed an explosion at the facility and what seems to be wreckage scattered around.
A Maxar image shared with CNN shows the same heavily damaged building with some debris still laying on the floor. Signs that the Russian military may have cleaned up the site.
A small but important victory in their ongoing covert war against a powerful enemy.
Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Ukraine.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCIUTTO: An entirely new category of warfare. Thanks to Fred Pleitgen for that exclusive report.
Well, aviation authorities here in the U.S. are now looking into major airports after several near-misses on the runways. We're going to have a live report on what they found, coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:46:18]
SCIUTTO: U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, the FAA, is launching a new probe into risks at 45 major airports after several near collisions on runways, the agency says, the audit will identify possible gaps in procedures, equipment and processes that put them at risk. The FAA will then recommend exactly how airports can improve safety.
Let's bring in CNN aviation correspondent Pete Muntean. And, Pete, I can't count the number of times I've had you on the air following some of these close calls. I wonder before we get into the details of the audit, what's the level of concern here when you speak to FAA officials and others.
PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: There's still a lot of concern and there's really shows that the issue has not been linked just yet. It's been going on since the start of last year and the FAA says that this audit will focus on these 45 busiest airports in the U.S. and honor them for the potential of these near collisions on runways known officially as runway incursions. I've been reporting on that since the start of last year.
And the headlines have really been emerging coast to coast the catalyst at New York's JFK in January 2023, American Airlines flight bound for London taxi out in front of a delta flight and was already accelerating for takeoff pretty harrowing. Nobody hurt in that incident, thankfully.
But investigators say the pilots of the American flight were distracted heads down in the cockpit with paperwork, essentially got lost on the ground, but the list really goes on here. Austin, Boston, Burbank, Reagan National Airport outside D.C. in June, the most recent incident just last month, a Nashville, just want you to look at this. The tires of an Alaska Airlines flight that was taking off blew out because the pilots had to slam on the brakes so hard when a Southwest Airlines flight taxied out in front of them. Investigators still doing interviews in that case.
Now, the FAA says this audit will really drill down on the risks at each individual airport. Remember, it might not always be pilots who are entirely at fault here could be something a bit more structural, and the FAA wants to know if there are gaps in the procedures or if there are issues with equipment or maybe there's a process at an airport that's causing some problems.
And investigators have been really concerned not only about the design of some airports, but also the lack of early warning technology, 35 airports have technology that alerts air traffic controllers in the tower of these impending collisions. But just to put that into context, there are 500 airports in the U.S. with commercial service or talking about only a small slice of the pie that have that technology or the NTSB has said the technology really saved the day at JFK in that near collision that we talked about just a second ago, and the NTSB chair, Jennifer Homendy, has told me she wanted it more airports we'll see though.
Of course a lot of eyes on this audit and the FAA says it'll be finished sometime next year -- Jim.
SCIUTTO: So it sounds like based on what you're saying that they already have some ideas as to what's behind this and what might help, including, for instance, the technology you're talking about.
So, what are the audits going to focus on that? MUNTEAN: Really the thing here is to focus on what happens on the ground at the airports. And remember the issue here, sometimes is that airplanes are taking off and landing on the same runway at the same time, doesn't happen that way in Europe, they have a much more robust system. They aren't -- airplanes aren't cleared to land there is still another airplane on the runway.
So there may be a bit of a procedural change here. This is something the FAA has been really digging into and there was an emergency safety summit, not long after this issue bubbled up in the spring of 2023. The next big thing that we may see here is in airplane technology to warn pilots of the conditions that recipe essentially the bad cocktail in the making when these -- on runway collisions could potentially happen.
[15:50:01]
So we will see if that comes to pass, although the FAA really needs to certify that technology first before it is an all commercial airliners in the U.S. And sometimes that can take some time.
SCIUTTO: And it involves some money, too. That takes some time.
Pete Muntean, thanks so much.
Speaking of technology, the world of artificial intelligence is rapidly expanding. Still ahead, the way an A.I. robot is changing even the art world and now bringing about a special auction coming soon.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCIUTTO: Kamala Harris speaking live now at a campaign event in Washington Cross, Pennsylvania -- Washington Crossing.
Let's listen in.
KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES & 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: -- their friends and leaders on the stage with me.
We had a chance to speak ahead of time. I thank you all for everything that you are doing and the courage you are showing. You know, this is an extraordinary climate right now, and I think we all recognize the courage that you are each showing to speak out so publicly and to put as we are saying, because we truly believe a country over party, so thank you.
Can we please applaud Bob and Christina and all of the folks on the stage, please?
(APPLAUSE)
HARRIS: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
So, if -- you all had a sit, please do sit. Yeah. So, as I think everyone here knows, we meet in a place that holds a very special meaning for our country. Here on Christmas night, 1776, General George Washington and over 2,000 troops crossed the icy Delaware River in darkness, then marched to Trenton where they surprised an outpost of enemy soldiers, and achieved a major victory in the American Revolution. And after we won the war, and achieved our independence, delegates from across the nation gathered not far from here in Philadelphia to write and to sign the Constitution of the United States.
(APPLAUSE)
[15:55:10]
HARRIS: And we remember and reflect on what that moment was, knowing that leading up to that, that work to write, to compose the Constitution of the United States that work was not easy. The founders often disagreed often quite passionately.
But in the end, the Constitution of the United States laid out the foundations of our democracy, including the rule of law that there would be checks and balances that we would have free and fair elections and a peaceful transfer of power.
(APPLAUSE)
HARRIS: And these principles and traditions have sustained our nation for over two centuries, sustained, because generations of Americans from all backgrounds, from all beliefs have cherished them, upheld them, and defended them. And now the baton is in our hands.
So I am joined today by over 100 Republican leaders from across Pennsylvania and across our country who are supporting --
(APPLAUSE)
HARRIS: -- my candidacy for president of the United States, and I am deeply honored to have their support.
Some served in statehouses, some in the United States Congress, some worked for other Republican presidents and presidential nominees, including Mitt Romney, John McCain, George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, and Ronald Reagan.
(APPLAUSE)
HARRIS: And some today served in Donald Trump's own administration.
We also have with us Republican voters from here in Pennsylvania and beyond who have been active in their Republican parties for years, who have supported Republican candidates up and down the ticket.
Now, I say all that to make an obvious point. In a typical election year, you all being here with me -- might be a bit surprising, dare I say unusual, but not in this election, not in this election. Because at stake in this race are the Democratic ideals that our founders and generations of Americans before us have fought for.
At stake in this election is the Constitution of the United States, it very self. We are here today because we share a core belief that we must put country before party.
(APPLAUSE)
(CHANTING)
HARRIS: Indeed, because we -- and we chant that with such great pride, because we all know, we all have so much more in common than what separates us. And at some point in the career of the folks who joined me on stage, one of the other things that we have in common is in our careers, we have each sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States.
(APPLAUSE)
HARRIS: And so, we know that sacred oath must always be honored and never violated. And that we should expect anyone who seeks the highest office in our land would meet that standard.
We here know the Constitution is not a relic from our past but determines whether we are a country where the people can speak freely, and even criticized the president without fear of being thrown in jail, are targeted by the military.
