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Elon Musk To Lead New Department For Trump's New Administration; Israel Not In Violation Of U.S. Law, Gaza Aid Will Be Monitored; Amsterdam Grapples With Football Violence Amid Anti-Semitic Unrest; Dozens Killed In Car Rampage Through Chinese Stadium. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired November 13, 2024 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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LAURA COATES, CNN ANCHOR: Well, treat yourself to a round of sausage, everyone. I don't know. Thanks for watching Anderson Cooper 360 is next. Jesus.
PAULA NEWTON, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Paula Newton live in Atlanta. I head right here on CNN Newsroom.
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ELON MUSK, CEO OF TESLA MOTORS: Your money is being wasted and the Department of Government Efficiency is going to fix that.
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NEWTON: Donald Trump picks Elon Musk to help lead a brand new department which they claim could slash trillions of dollars from the U.S. government. The U.S. decides to not follow through on threats to halt arms sales to Israel despite claims that Israel has not done enough to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza.
And the host of COP29 climate summit slams his country's critics while calling oil and gas a gift of the God.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Live from Atlanta. This is CNN NEWSROOM with Paula Newton.
NEWTON: One of the major questions about the incoming Trump administration has finally been answered. What role will Elon Musk play? Well, the U.S. President-elect has announced the Tesla CEO and Vivek Ramaswamy will lead what he calls the Department of Government Efficiency. Trump says they will be in charge of cutting bureaucracy, excessive regulations and wasteful spending.
Now, Musk released a statement saying this will send shockwaves through the system and anyone involved in government waste, which is a lot of people. Trump says, quote, a smaller government with more efficiency and less bureaucracy will be the perfect gift to the -- to America on the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. I am confident they will succeed.
Now, the incoming president has also announced a number of other picks for his cabinet and his administration. He, in fact, asked Fox News host Pete Hegseth to be his defense secretary. Agseth served in the U.S. Army in Iraq and Afghanistan and is known for his work as a veterans advocate.
Trump also chose John Ratcliffe to be CIA director. The former Republican congressman from Texas served as director of national intelligence for a part of the first Trump administration.
The president elect has picked longtime friend Steve Witkoff as special envoy to the Middle East. The real estate developer is also a chair of Trump's presidential inaugural committee.
And Trump has announced Mike Huckabee as his choice for U.S. ambassador to Israel. The former Arkansas governor has a long history of supporting Israel, and that includes its claims to the West Bank. And he made this controversial comment about Palestinians in 2008. Listen.
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MIKE HUCKABBE, FORMER ARKANSAS GOVERNOR: Basically, there really is no such thing as I have to be careful in saying this because people really get upset. There's really no such thing as a Palestinian. There's not. You have Arabs and Persians. And there's such complexity within that. But there's really no such thing that's. That's been a political tool to try to force land away from Israel.
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NEWTON: Ron Brownstein is CNN senior political analyst and the senior editor at The Atlantic, and he joins me now from Los Angeles. OK, Ron, really good to see you. Listen, we have a lot to get through here. We're going to have to be as quick as that transition team.
So, before we get to the specifics, pardon me, Trump Cabinet 2.0. Is this the cabinet that Americans have voted for from what you've seen so far?
RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, it is the cabinet Americans voted for and it is a cabinet that is going to be more militant and more extreme than Trump 1.0. I mean, what you don't see here is the important point. In Trump 1.0, Trump was making concessions or deference or outreach to different power centers and the party.
This time he is picking people he believes are personally loyal to him. There are many choices that are probably causing heads to scratch elsewhere in the Republican Party. The defense secretary, for example, Elon Musk and Vivek, you know, being asked to overhaul the federal government. Trump does not believe he really needs to give ground to anyone inside the GOP. And this cabinet reflects that.
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NEWTON: And let's get to that. Nominee for the Defense secretary position, Fox host, now former, I guess, and military vet Hegseth. I want you to listen to what he said just a few days ago. Listen.
BROWNSTEIN: Yes.
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PETE HEGSETH, AUTHOR AND FOX NEWS HOST: I'm surprised there hasn't been more blowback on that already in the book because I'm straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles. It hasn't made us more effective, hasn't made us more lethal, has made fighting more complicated.
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NEWTON: You know, according to CNN reporting, Ron, many even around Trump were surprised at this appointment. What do you think it means for the Defense Department and for military strategy going forward?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, it reflects Trump's belief that, again, that he does not have to defer to any. I mean, this was a pick that was so outside the boundaries, certainly someone who has served their country with distinction.
But in terms of having the management or military experience to manage a department of this magnitude, you know, this would not be where anyone would have predicted. There is a certain inherent logic or convergence of Trump naming a Fox News host to his cabinet.
But I think this is just a reminder of how disruptive he intends to be across how many fronts. And we will see how far if any Republicans in the Senate go on pushing back against something like this. NEWTON: Yes, exactly. Which is a good point because some of this does
have to be approved. Getting to the Department of Government Efficiency, Elon Musk. Ron, he may be an inventor, but you and I both know this is not an original idea. Al Gore did it first in 1993. Take a listen to him with the Letterman Late Night.
BROWNSTEIN: OK.
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AL GORE, FORMER VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's costing taxpayers a lot of money. That's why we want to get --
DAVID LETTERMAN, HOST, "LATE NIGHT WITH DAVID LETTERMAN": Testing procedure is what's costing the money.
GORE: The way we buy the government buys stuff like this is crazy.
LETTERMAN: I guess I just don't understand politics.
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NEWTON: So that was, you know, the ashtray addition.
BROWNSTEIN: Yes.
NEWTON: You know, Al Gore was making a point saying, look, the government spends too much. I mean, look at the heart of it. Do you believe this is a stunt or perhaps worse, a purge of the federal government? Or can Elon Musk actually do what Americans want him to do, which is cut the fat from government?
BROWNSTEIN: You know, it's not even Al Gore. That's the full precedent. Paula, do you remember, I don't know if anybody remembers the name Peter Grace. Peter Grace was an American CEO who was named by Ronald Reagan to lead his Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy Department of Efficiency. And when Reagan named Peter Grace in March of 1982. He said, we want your team to work like tireless bloodhounds. Don't leave any stone unturned in your search to root out inefficiency.
And you can see how effectively inefficiency has been rooted out in the federal government here, 43 years later. You know, there's a long history of people in business thinking that they can bring kind of those approaches to the federal government.
The history is, you know, that these efforts, while they may find some inefficiencies, they cannot fundamentally, you know, restructure federal operations, both because all sorts of rules, but also because the vast majority of federal money is not wasted.
You know, the biggest thing the federal government does is provide retirement security to seniors through Medicare and Social Security and Medicaid for long term care. You know, it's been described as an insurance company with an army.
And so, yes, you can squeeze here and there, but there is no way to radically reduce federal spending along the magnitude that Ronald Reagan promised or that Donald Trump and Elon Musk are now promising without significantly changing what it does. And that will be a whole order of different fight than the idea that, you know, people are spending too much on envelopes.
NEWTON: Yes. And that is the bottom line there, is that you're talking about something that is transformative if they are to take that much money out of government. OK. Earlier we heard Governor Huckabee's position on a Palestinian state as the U.S. the nominee for the U.S. Ambassador to Israel.
BROWNSTEIN: Yes.
NEWTON: What do you believe that Donald Trump is expecting from this, especially if, as expected, he nominates Marco Rubio as the Secretary of State?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, look, I mean, you know, the Arab American voters who voted for Trump in Michigan, like the Latino voters who voted for him in large numbers in Nevada and Arizona, were making a bet that he was not going to do exactly what he said he was going to do.
I mean, every indication is that Trump is going to give Netanyahu more of a free hand than Biden did. However ineffectual Biden has been about influencing Israel's behavior. Trump is going to go further in that direction. Same thing on mass deportation.
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I mean, the appointments of Tom Holman and Stephen Miller makes very clear that Trump is going to do what he said and that we've talked about this before. I mean, there is academic research that is very clear. When presidents get elected, they try to do what they ran on. They can't always do it. Sometimes they get stopped by Congress, sometimes they get stopped by the courts.
But anyone looking at these appointments, really across the board, you know, Trump is sending a clear signal that even the most polarizing and confrontational ideas that he ran on, he is going to try to implement. And everyone, I think now has to brace for that very, you know, that potentially very astringent and confrontational new reality.
NEWNTON: OK, Ron Brownstein, we will leave it there. We got through a lot. Appreciate it.
BROWNSTEIN: Thank you.
NEWTON: The U.S. says Israel is not in violation of U.S. law and has made some progress in improving the humanitarian situation in Gaza. These comments from the State Department came on the 30-day deadline for Israel to have taken steps to improve the situation in the enclave. But not everyone agrees with the U.S. assessment.
Eight humanitarian aid organizations say Israel has failed to meet the U.S. criteria. At the United Nations on Tuesday, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. stressed there's so much more work to do.
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LINDA THOMAS-GREENFIELD, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE UN: Israel has taken some important steps, including restoring aid deliveries to the north. Still, Israel must ensure its actions are fully implemented and its improvements sustained over time.
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NEWTON: The U.N. Security Council, meantime, was meeting and it comes as experts warn of a strong likelihood of a famine in northern Gaza, where an Israeli military offensive is still underway at this hour. One top UN Official had this to say about the dire situation.
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JOYCE MSUYA, U.N. ACTING UNDERSECRETARY-GENERAL FOR HUMANITARIAN AFFAIRS: Most of Gaza is now a wasteland of rubble. What distinction was made and what precautions were taken if more than 70 percent of civilian housing is either damaged or destroyed. We are witnessing acts reminiscent of the gravest international crimes.
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NEWTON: CNN's Alex Marquardt now has our details from Washington.
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ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: The situation on the ground in Gaza, particularly in the northern part of the Gaza Strip, is truly desperate as the Israeli military continues to besiege much of the area.
On Tuesday, the Biden administration said that it would not be making any policy changes towards Israel. This comes after a strongly worded letter was sent last month by the Biden administration saying that Israel could be in violation of U.S. law if it did not improve the humanitarian situation. The humanitarian access, the amount of aid going into the Gaza Strip and violating U.S. law could threaten the aid, including military aid, that would go to Israel. The U.S. said that it wanted to see dramatic improvement on more than a dozen different concrete measures.
Ahead of the Biden administration's announcement on Tuesday, we did hear in a joint statement from eight different aid agencies, and they said together that Israel not only failed to meet the U.S. criteria that would indicate support to the humanitarian response, but concurrently took actions that dramatically worsened the situation on the ground, particularly in northern Gaza.
So those aid agencies saying that Israel is actually making things worse, which stands in stark contrast to what we heard from a State Department spokesman who said that progress is being made, that the U.S. does continue to want to see changes made by Israel, but that Israel is not, for now, in violation of U.S. law. At the same time, we also heard from the United Nations. They said the
situation in northern Gaza is nothing short of catastrophic. That's a quote. And that people in northern Gaza are begging for pieces of bread and for water. Alex Marquardt, CNN, Washington.
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NEWTON: The Dutch parliament will hold a debate in the coming hours on the violence against Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam. Dutch police detained several people on Tuesday who had defied a ban on protest that was put in place after violent clashes last week between Israeli football fans and pro-Palestinian supporters. Violent protests continued this week, with protesters setting a tram and bus on fire on Monday. CNN's Nic Robertson now has the details on the weekend of unrest.
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NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR (voice-over): In the heart of Amsterdam, antisemitic thugs attack a tram, throwing rocks, then fireworks, setting it alight. Next, hurling racist slurs. Cancer Jews, one shouts.
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The Monday night violence contravening strict police emergency measures intended to prevent such outbursts. Three people arrested. The fabled European city has been on edge since last week when fans of Israeli soccer team Maccabee Tel Aviv arrived in the city ahead of a match with the Dutch team Ajax Thursday. Maccabee fans were chased and beaten. Israeli officials quick to draw horrific World War II comparisons.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's for the children. For the children.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): Dutch officials quickly shouldering responsibility.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Free Palestine now. Free Palestine.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Telegram Groups where people spoke of hunting Jews. That is so shocking, so reprehensible, I can't get over it yet. It is a disgrace.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): But the protest ban and the official mea culpa isn't sitting well with some of the city's residents who point to the night before the match when Maccabee fans tore down Palestinian flags and pre-match chanted anti-Arab slurs.
UNDIENTIFIED MALE (through translator): What happened in Amsterdam is extremely serious. It's totally uninhibited antisemitism. And it's the return of absolute evil that we absolutely must combat.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): French officials are worried too. On Thursday, Paris hosts an Israel-France soccer match. 4,000 police have already been called up to stop potential violence. The sudden escalation of Europe antisemitism is so disturbing the Dutch government set to announce additional measures to tackle the hatred by the end of this week. That brazen antisemitic attacks continue hints at the depth of anger on Dutch streets. Nic Robertson, CNN, London.
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NEWTON: Police are investigating a car crash in southern China that left dozens of people dead and injured at an outdoor sports center. We will have a live report with the latest details.
Plus, as China and Russia grow closer, we'll look at their vision for a new world order as they work to counter the West.
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NEWTON: People in southern China are leaving flowers and candles in tribute to dozens of victims of a car crash that appears to have been deliberate. Police say 35 five people were killed and more than 40 injured on Monday.
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That was when a man drove an SUV into crowds who were actually exercising at an outdoor sports center. Police caught the 62-year-old driver as he tried to flee the scene. CNN's Marc Stewart has been following the story for us from Beijing.
I mean, obviously, Marc, this is an incident that has been so difficult to fathom, you know, so many people being brutally mowed down that way. What more are we learning though about the investigation at this point?
MARC STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT: No question, Paula. The images that we just saw as well as postings on social media really show the extent of the grief in China, particularly in southern China where this happened.
According to police, the man now in custody, the 62-year-old man, was apparently unhappy about his divorce settlement and about how some property in particular was being handled. They believe this may be what led up to this tragedy.
Police want to talk to him, they want to question him, but as of last night he was unconscious. They say when he was fleeing the scene he tried to hurt himself. He may have harmed himself. A knife was found inside the vehicle and he has some injuries to his neck. Perhaps we'll get some more updates later on from police, but at this point they have not been able to question the individual.
Across China there is this profound sense of sadness to the level that top government officials have weighed including Chinese President Xi Jinping, who called for all out efforts to take care of those who have been impacted. And in particular the grief, the aftermath as this tragedy really begins to sink in for many families.
Not surprising, some of the social media posts that were posted early on in this investigation have been removed, censored from the government. That is not unusual, but it does give us an indication as to just how sensitive of a moment this is in China.
There is some important context though to also put out there. Violent crime in China is very rare. There are more than a billion people here and if you look at the violent crime rates, they are very low. It's very difficult to get a gun.
So when something like this happens, it is extremely attention getting. That is not to say we have not seen incidents like that. In fact, in recent weeks, in recent months, we have seen several cases where people have been gathered in large settings and someone tries to do harm.
In fact, it was back in September, there was a group of students and parents outside and a bus then plowed into that crowd. It led to deaths, it led to injuries. But despite what these statistics may say, Paula, it certainly does not make the grief and sadness here in China in this most recent case any easier to comprehend and to deal with for that matter.
NEWTON: Yes, for sure. Some profound grief that everyone is grappling with as again, police continue to investigate. Marc Stewart for us live from Beijing. Appreciate it.
China and Russia are drawing closer together, both militarily and economically in order to counter what they see as growing threats from the West. And they're trying to capitalize on the uncertainty that the new Trump administration in the United states will bring. CNN's Fred Pleitgen reports now from Moscow.
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FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Jet fighters streaking across the skies at China's largest air show, aiming to show just how fast the People's Republic is modernizing its massive military.
China's main partner is Russia. The head of the Russian National Security Council, Sergei Shoigu in Beijing, praising ever closer ties. We are not a military political alliance like the ones formed during the Cold War, he says. Relations between our countries are superior to those forms of interstate ties.
This as China shows off its brand new stealth fighter called the J35A for the first time ever, while the Russians were showcasing their own stealth jet, the SU57, which has already been used in combat operations.
Russia and China have dramatically expanded their military cooperation in recent years with regular exercises like these major naval drills the Russians say were the largest in more than 30 years.
This as Vladimir Putin says he wants what he calls a New World Order with less U.S. influence and more power in the hands of countries like Russia and China. Russian Chinese cooperation in world affairs acts as one of the main stabilizing factors in the global arena, he said.
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And China's Xi Jinping added, in the face of the turbulent international situation and external environment, the two sides should continue to uphold the original aspiration of friendship for generations to come.
All this as relations with the U.S. grow ever more adversarial. Washington concerned about Chinese territorial claims and military expansion in the South China Sea. President-elect Donald Trump vowing to rein Beijing in.
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT-ELECT: There are certain countries I can tell you, every one I can give you from top to bottom. China is the toughest of all, but were taking care of China with the tariffs.
PLEITGEN (voice-over): But the U.S. now also faces an emboldened North Korea. Kim Jong Un, heavily courted by Russian President Vladimir Putin, recently conducting another round of ballistic missile tests. The U.S. also believes more than 10,000 North Korean soldiers are currently fighting on Russia's side in its war against Ukraine.
Russian political analyst Sergei Markov telling me the alliances forged by Vladimir Putin will be a major issue for the new administration.
SERGEI MARKOV, POLITICAL ANALYST: All this coalition has a major goal to support each other in only one sovereignty. And because the challenge to sovereignty, comes first of all from United States in general and the Western coalition, it moves them automatically as a little bit anti-American.
PLEITGEN (voice-over): Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Moscow.
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NEWTON: Day three of COP29 is now underway as the U.N. chief warns the planet is in the final countdown to limit global warming. Host country Azerbaijan defends its continued use of oil and gas. We'll have all the details when we come back.
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NEWTON: You are watching CNN Newsroom. I'm Paula Newton.
The third day of the United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP29 is getting underway. Tuesday kicked off the world leaders Climate action Summit where the U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres issued a dire warning on the urgency to act. Listen.
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ANTONIO GUTERRES, U.N. SECRETARY-GENERAL: The sound you hear is the ticking clock. We are in the final countdown to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius. And time is not on our side. (END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: Meanwhile, the president of Azerbaijan, the host country, pushed back on what he called the West's double standards, rejecting the label of a petrostate and defending his country's right to use any and all available natural resources, including oil and gas.
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ILHAM AILYEV, AZERBAIJAN PRESIDENT: It's a gift of the god. Every natural resource, whether it's oil, gas, wind, sun, gold, silver, copper. All that are natural resources. And countries should not be blamed for having them and should not be blamed for bringing these resources to the market, because the market needs them. The people needs them.
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NEWTON: Joining me now from Monterey, California is Rob Jackson. Mr. Jackson -- Mr. Jackson is a climate scientist at Stanford University and chair of the Global Carbon Project.
And it's really good to have you. We appreciate it as we continue to watch things unfold at COP-29.
The research just released from the carbon -- the Global Carbon Project, in fact, shows that 2024 on track to again set records for emissions from fossil fuels.
Given that, why do you believe that this summit does not seem to show any kind of urgency at this point or any real hope for progress?
ROB JACKSON, CLIMATE SCIENTIST, STANFORD UNIVERSITY: Well, it's a great question.
And first of all, thanks for having me, Paula.
I think part of the reason is because everything's in a holding pattern since the U.S. election. Nobody knows what's going to happen.
And I don't have very high expectations for this COP. I expect to see some progress on climate finance, loss and damage fees. What do we owe countries and people if their home is now submerged by the sea or if they lost their home to floods in Pakistan, turbocharged by climate change?
I expect to see some funds go to climate adaptation and maybe clean power so that nations who are developing can leapfrog dirtier fossil fuels and go right to cleaner renewables.
But not too much will happen, I think.
NEWTON: And in fact, your report says that we have -- we've not yet peaked on emissions. And I do want to go back to your original point here. For decades, many looked to the United States for leadership on this.
The Biden administration put in place unprecedented action on climate. But I want you to listen now to Trump's nominee for the Environmental Protection Agency and what he had to say.
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LEE ZELDIN, FORMER U.S. HOUSE REPUBLICAN: There are regulations that the left wing of this country have been advocating through regulatory power, that ends up causing businesses to -- to go in the wrong direction. And --
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NEWTON: I mean, his priorities, if in fact, he is confirmed, seem pretty clear there. And they seem to dovetail perfectly with what the president of Azerbaijan said.
The fact that the priority seems to be, at this point in time, economic development, certainly not putting hand in hand, saving the planet with that economic development.
JACKSON: Yes, it's correct. And I expect Trump 2.0 to be much more aggressive than Trump 1.0.
He campaigned on killing and canceling the EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency. His first administration targeted NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Geological Survey. All of the agencies that monitor the health of our air and our water.
And I expect him to go after clean car standards, clean power plant standards, reduce incentives for clean energy. And this is really a terrible idea, not just because of climate change in the future, but for our health today.
I mean, pollution from cars and coal still kills 100,000 Americans a year unnecessarily. One in five deaths worldwide comes from fossil fuel use. We don't need that anymore. All of us want cleaner air and water for our kids. We're going to have to fight for clean air and water over the next four years.
NEWTON: You know, there has been some progress, not just from the IRA, the Inflation Reduction Act, from the Biden administration, but also Elon Musk does seem to have a place in the administration. He, of course, is the inventor, founder and still leader of Tesla in terms of electric -- electric vehicles.
But I also want you to listen to one of the world's largest emitters on their climate goal. And that's ExxonMobil. In a statement to CNN saying, "A second U.S. exit from the Paris climate agreement will have profound implications for the United States' efforts to reduce its own emissions and for international efforts to combat climate change. We advocate for policy that accounts for security, affordability, reliability, and environmental stewardship, not drastic changes."
It seemed that we had come so far. Do you have some optimism that, again, people that are noticing the changes within their own environment, companies that at one point were the world's largest emitters will bring us back from the brink here and do the right thing, even though there is not perhaps the government leadership?
JACKSON: Yes, I think the Exxon example is a fascinating one. Companies want certainty. They don't want a ping-pong match in the White House with U.S. policy: one administration wants clean air and water; another administration does something different.
We just sort of whipsaw back and forth in this country. And that is a hard way for our companies to do business.
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I am optimistic that we can maintain standards and continue to -- to make progress. I wrote a book about it recently, called "Into the Clear Blue Sky." It's a path for going from climate despair to climate repair.
And I believe that the opportunities are out there, and that clean energy ultimately will win. But as I mentioned a minute ago, we are going to have to fight to make this happen.
NEWTON: Yes. And Professor Jackson, you make a good point in the sense that it is the generations that are coming behind us here that, really, we are trying to endow a much cleaner and better planet.
Rob Jackson for us as we continue to watch COP-29. Appreciate it.
JACKSON: Thank you, Paula. Take care.
JACKSON: Now bitcoin is riding a post-election rally that's taking it to record highs. How Donald Trump's presidency could impact the world of cryptocurrency. That's next.
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NEWTON: And welcome back.
The most senior leader in the Church of England, Justin Welby, is stepping down.
A report found that Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, was responsible for covering up child abuse in the church. The main perpetrator, a British lawyer named John Smyth, who reported to authorities in 2013.
But the review found that his physical, sexual, psychological and spiritual attacks, which began in the 1970s, were allowed to continue until his death in 2018.
It's unclear when Welby will leave his post. And in the hours ahead, the media empire of an American conspiracy theorist will be up for auction in a court-mandated sale that has already attracted seven-figure bidders.
Alex Jones owes the families of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims more than $1 billion. The sale of Infowars is to help them pay up, but the fate of the platform is uncertain.
Some bidders, including Trump adviser Roger Stone, might allow Jones to continue broadcasting. Others may be hoping to shut down the site, and Jones's lies, for good.
Bitcoin hit a record high Tuesday, coming within a hair's breadth of $90,000. The world's biggest cryptocurrency has been surging since Donald Trump won the White House, with investors expecting his administration will be crypto friendly.
Vanessa Yurkevich has our report.
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VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Bitcoin soaring to new heights. Flirting with a new record: 90,000 U.S. dollars per coin. It's the latest in a crypto frenzy fueled by President Trump's reelection win.
The industry believes Trump's win signals a new crypto-friendly government, a departure from the Biden administration's harsher crackdown.
KARA CALVERT, VICE PRESIDENT FOR U.S. POLICY, COINBASE: We are now on the -- on the precipice of changing course. I think what President Trump did was lay out a very robust and a very clear vision. And that, I think, was something we had not seen. So, it was a very stark choice from the previous administration.
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YURKEVICH (voice-over): Bitcoin, a digital cryptocurrency, trades on some unregulated exchanges and has no central regulating authority and is not backed by the government or a bank. It can be very volatile.
JAMIE DIMON, CEO, JPMORGAN CHASE: I've always been deeply opposed to crypto, bitcoin, et cetera. If I were the governments, I'd close it down.
YURKEVICH (voice-over): President-elect Trump was once a crypto skeptic. During his first term, he said it was, quote, "based on thin air."
But in recent months, he's changed his tune, accepting crypto campaign donations.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT-ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: Hello, bitcoiners!
YURKEVICH (voice-over): And speaking at Bitcoin 2024 in July. TRUMP: I'm laying out my plan to ensure that the United States will be the crypto capital of the planet and the bitcoin superpower of the world.
YURKEVICH (voice-over): In September, Trump helped create a new crypto business: World Liberty Financial. That same month, he stopped by a crypto bar in New York City's Greenwich Village.
He also proposed a national crypto stockpile.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The first transaction by a president on the bitcoin protocol. History.
TRUMP: You know what that means? That's history.
YURKEVICH (voice-over): The president-elect has vowed to oust SEC chairman Gary Gensler, who has sought more regulation over the cryptocurrency market and helped lead the takedown of FTX's infamous Sam Bankman-Fried, who defrauded thousands of customers.
GARY GENSLER, CHAIRPERSON, U.S. SECURITIES & EXCHANGE COMMISSION: It's an innovation, but innovations don't long thrive if they don't also build trust. I mean, the automobile wouldn't have survived if you didn't have traffic lights.
YURKEVICH (voice-over): But as Trump assembles his administration, he's surrounding himself with crypto-friendly advisers, most notably Elon Musk, who argues it promotes freedom.
ELON MUSK, BILLIONAIRE: I do think crypto, by -- by its very nature, is -- helps with individual freedom.
YURKEVICH (voice-over): Vanessa Yurkevich, CNN, New York.
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NEWTON: And finally, for us in Australia, thousands of people are lining up to smell the flowers, particularly one unusual plant that only blooms -- yes -- once a decade.
The corpse flower gave a rare sight to visitors this week in the city of Geelong, just south of Melbourne. You can see him plugging his nose already, because its reputation comes from a putrid stench it releases when blooming, which can attract pollinators like beetles and flies.
Now each bloom only lasts 24 to 48 hours.
Now, if you can't make it down under in time, the garden does offer a live stream. Unfortunately, you're just going to have to imagine the smell for yourself.
I'm Paula Newton. I'll be back at the top of the hour with more CNN NEWSROOM. But first, WORLD SPORT starts after a quick break.
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