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Judge Delays Decision in Trump Hush Money Case; Archbishop of Canterbury Resigns Over Child Abuse Case; Four Separate Storms Churn in West Pacific at Same Time; Scientists Fear Glacial Melt Has Impact on Volcanic Eruptions; Concern Over Israeli Settler Violence in West Bank. Aired 4:30-5a ET
Aired November 13, 2024 - 04:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:30:00]
CHRISTINA MACFARLANE, CNN ANCHOR: Hi, welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM. Here are some of the top stories we're following today.
U.S. President Joe Biden will meet with Donald Trump later today at the White House. The two are expected to discuss a peaceful transfer of power. Now this meeting did not take place after Biden won the election in 2020. Trump will also meet with House Speaker Mike Johnson while in Washington.
People in southern China are leaving flowers and candles in tribute to the victims of the country's deadliest known attack on the public in a decade. Police say 35 people were killed and more than 40 others were injured after a man allegedly drove into the crowd in an outdoor sports center. The driver was caught by police as he tried to flee the scene.
And authorities in Ecuador say they have regained control of one of the country's largest and most dangerous prisons. Violent clashes between inmates at the penitentiary in Guayaquil left at least 15 people dead and 14 injured Tuesday. At least nine inmates are expected to face murder charges.
MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: Donald Trump's pick for defense secretary is raising some eyebrows amongst his inner circle and at the Pentagon. Here's Fox News host Pete Hegseth, an army veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Critics point to his lack of government experience and Trump says Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will head what he calls the Department of Government Efficiency. Their goal is to cut bureaucracy, regulation and wasteful spending.
The president-elect will also have to decide if he'll pardon any January 6th rioters. A former Trump attorney says that's a difficult choice.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TY COBB, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE LAWYER: This is the type of conduct that, when viewed internationally, makes it impossible to distinguish the United States from a, you know, from a third world country or a, you know, South American dictatorship. This is really lawlessness of the highest order and there's no principled basis for it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Meanwhile, New York prosecutors and attorneys for Donald Trump will have another week to hash out how to proceed in Trump's hush money case. The judge's latest decision is raising questions about whether Trump will ever be sentenced for his 34 felony convictions. CNN's Paula Reid reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Judge Juan Merchan has delayed his decision about whether a president-elect Trump's conviction in the hush money case earlier this year on 34 counts of falsifying business records should be tossed out after the Supreme Court ruled that presidents have some immunity for their official acts, including the fact that you cannot use official acts as evidence in a case, which is exactly what happened in the Manhattan case.
Now, the reason the judge decided to delay this is because both sides, both prosecutors and defense attorneys, agreed that they need more time to figure out exactly how they address the questions in this case now that Trump is headed back to the White House and is president- elect.
CNN has previously reported that the Trump team will now argue that as president-elect Trump cannot be sentenced, that he has constitutional protections from either being indicted or prosecuted or even sentenced by state actors.
Now, it's unclear if that will be successful, but the judge has at least one more week before he has to make any decision in this case and we can expect both sides will likely weigh in with their thoughts on this over the next week.
Paula Reid, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MACFARLANE: 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.
FOSTER: Alex Jones owes the families of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims over a billion dollars. The sale of Infowars is to help him pay some of that money, 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' lies for good.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Church of England's most senior leader, has resigned.
MACFARLANE: A report found that Justin Welby covered up a serial child abuse case. CNN Vatican correspondent Christopher Lamb has the details. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRISTOPHER LAMB, CNN VATICAN CORRESPONDENT: The Archbishop of Canterbury resigning on Tuesday after a report found he failed to properly deal with child sexual abuse. Archbishop Justin Welby came under huge pressure over the handling of the case of John Smyth, one of the worst abusers to be associated with the Church of England.
[04:35:00]
Smyth abused up to 130 boys and young men, but died in 2018, never having faced justice.
The Archbishop in 2013 was told of abuse but has admitted to not doing enough to report that to police. He, in a statement on Tuesday, accepted personal and institutional responsibility for failing to deal with Smyth.
Now, the Archbishop came under huge pressure to resign. A member of the Church of England's bishops called on him to step down, saying his position was untenable. The Archbishop's decision to resign is without a precedent. Archbishops of Canterbury don't tend to resign, and this is the first time that someone in his position has stepped down due to mishandling of abuse.
Now, the report into Smyth found a widespread cover-up of his abuses, and there may well be further resignations to come as the Church of England faces a crisis over its handling of safeguarding.
Christopher Lamb, CNN, London.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MACFARLANE: Now, the Philippines could soon get hit by its third major storm in less than a week. Usagi is now officially a typhoon, according to the latest alert from the U.S. Joint Typhoon Warning Centre.
FOSTER: It's expected to make landfall in the northern Philippines, which has borne the brunt of unprecedented tropical storm activity in the region. CNN meteorologist Chad Myers has the latest.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: What a couple of weeks it has been here, and still more weather to come. From Usagi to Man-yi, these are the areas there are still going to get rainfall from the storms that are still coming. Now, Da Nang picked up some rain, as we expected, in the overnight hours, but really only about 100 millimeters. Most of the heavier rainfall was south of Da Nang.
Now, we take a look at Toraji, the storm that did affect the northern part of the Philippines a couple of days ago, really falling apart now. And that's kind of what happens when the water isn't as warm as it has been. And there's a little bit of shear out there, too, but really, we're going to take this storm and turn it into nothing. There were some showers in Hong Kong today.
Now, let's pay attention and focus on what's still coming -- Usagi. Usagi will likely be a typhoon of about 185 to maybe 195 miles per hour as it makes contact here with the extreme northeastern part of the Philippines. A very strong event.
Then, farther off to the east, still to come, there's Man-yi. And that's where it's going all the way down to the south, and then making another run at the exact same place here across the northeastern part of the Philippines.
Now, will they be 30 or 40 miles away, likely, from the landfalls? But they could be very, very close. And many, many models are taking this very seriously when it talks to -- he's talking about so much precipitation that could come down 250 to 500 millimeters more rainfall in places where we just showed you all of that flooding.
So, yes, there will be wind in some spots. We'll pick up 200 kph. That's a lot of wind. But it's the rainfall on top of the mountains that could really get people in trouble as that water tries to go down the hill and all the way back out toward the ocean. One, two, three, four, two gone, two still to come.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Bigger issues of the climate underway at the COP29 summit, day three.
MACFARLANE: Tuesday, the U.N. Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, issued a dire warning on the urgency to act.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
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)
MACFARLANE: Whether there will be any urgency to act, though, is another question, given the lack of world leaders attending.
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.
FOSTER: I do think there's some sympathy for that debate. I mean, huge questions about Azerbaijan and its impact on the environment. But at the same time, it was decided a long time ago that it should be held there. So the debate should have been then rather than --
MACFARLANE: Potentially, although there are accusations of it being held there as an attempt to greenwash Azerbaijan's reputation when it comes to the oil industry. It's a complicated picture. Now, the impact of climate change on Iceland's rapidly melting
glaciers is well known. But what about on its volcanoes? CNN meteorologist Elisa Raffa reports on the scientists working to find out whether melting glaciers can make for more explosive volcanic eruptions.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ELISA RAFFA, CNN METEOROLOGIST (voice-over): A land of ice and fire, Iceland is renowned for both its stunning volcanoes and glaciers.
[04:40:00]
But scientists are now studying whether climate change is affecting the balance between these two natural wonders. Around 2 million tourists visit Iceland each year, many hoping to see an active volcano showering red hot lava or get a glimpse of a cool blue glacier thousands of years old.
But researchers say there could be a connection between melting glaciers, which are shrinking because of rising global temperatures, and the frequency of volcanic eruptions.
MICHELLE PARKS, VOLCANOLOGIST: Iceland is essentially one of the best places in the world to study this. It's a natural laboratory because we have both volcanism and glaciers. So at the moment, about 10 percent of Iceland is covered by glaciers. And we have over 32 active volcanoes here.
RAFFA (voice-over): Scientists say the Askja volcano in Iceland's central highlands has risen about 80 centimeters in the past three years because of pressure building underneath it that's pushing the ground upwards. The theory is that magma or pressurized gas under a volcano increases as glaciers melt because the heavy ice no longer weighs down the Earth's crust, allowing magma to move more freely underground. And those subterranean pressure changes can permeate to areas which aren't directly under glaciers, like Askja, which is just north of the country's largest glacier.
But with recent eruptions in Grindavik, a town in southwest Iceland, which not only put on a spectacular lava show, but also forced the evacuation of the town's residents, scientists are eager to learn more about what's triggering such volatility.
FREYSTEINN SIGMUNDSSON, GEOPHYSICIST, UNIVERSITY OF ICELAND: There are many benefits of volcanoes, all the geothermal, geothermal heat, we heat all the houses with geothermal, so lots of benefits. But now with the activity in southwest Iceland, where a lot of property has been destroyed and people have needed to move out, we are again reminded about how hazardous volcanoes are.
RAFFA (voice-over): Preliminary results in one study show that in the last three decades, magma beneath Iceland was produced at a rate two to three times what it would have been without ice loss. A possible pressure cooker lurking in one of the world's most picturesque places.
Elisa Raffa, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: The Princess of Wales will host her annual Christmas Carol concert at Westminster Abbey on December the 6th. This year's Together at Christmas concert will shine a light on those who serve others in their communities and will focus on how we rely on one another during difficult times in our lives.
MACFARLANE: Very glad to see she's able to do that this year. The news of the princess holding this concert comes after her appearances at the Remembrance Day events just over the weekend. She announced she was cancer-free back in September and has been easing back into public duties. The concert will be broadcast in the U.K. on Christmas.
FOSTER: Really is her big thing because it's very much her brainchild. You remember she played the piano at it once, but I mean, there's a weird sort of constitutional element to it. William would always walk in front because she's junior to William, but this is the occasion where she takes the lead and he walks behind and supports her, which is a big message from him, I think.
MACFARLANE: Yes, will be even more so this year, won't it?
Now, the holidays have come early to London's Natural History Museum, at least for one of its biggest attractions. The museum's resident, Tyrannosaurus Rex, is sporting a new Christmas jumper and Santa hat, featuring one of the museum's latest additions.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SAM BARNES, RETAIL COMMERCIAL MANAGER, NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM: Yes, so the jumper features Fern, who is our newest member to the collection, and she's a cast of the nation's favorite dinosaur, Dippy. So she's outside in our new nature garden and we wanted to pay tribute to her as being the star of our Christmas jumper.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: It took a team of people to outfit the T-Rex in this Christmas attire, we are told. Well, it'd be tricky to do it on your own.
MACFARLANE: It would.
FOSTER: Visitors can see it up close for free throughout the holiday season of the Christmas jumper thing.
MACFARLANE: I guess this means it's silly season already, doesn't it? Yes, I mean, I love a Christmas jumper, but we are still in a -- oh, you don't know me in Christmas. Just you wait. Give it a month. But we're a bit early, I think, to be jumping on that bandwagon.
However, we are getting ready for our first look at a fan favorite, my personal favorite. Bridget Jones is back and she is still looking for love.
[04:45:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: Israel's far-right finance minister sparking condemnation after ordering preparations for the annexation of settlements in the Israeli occupied West Bank.
MACFARLANE: That move likely to heighten tensions amid a surge in Israeli settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank. CNN's Nic Robertson has this.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR (voice-over): This is the face of Israeli settler intimidation in the occupied West Bank.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Next time I won't be nice.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is my house! Don't touch my cows! This is my house!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't f**king care if this is your house. This is my house now.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): It was early August. Hamdan Blall is the Palestinian farmer they'd come to intimidate.
HAMDAN BLALL, PALESTINIAN FARMER: I was asleep under this grapeseed tree. I was asleep there.
ROBERTSON: This is your farm here?
BLALL: Yes. And when I wake up, I saw the cows grazing.
ROBERTSON: The settlers cows?
BLALL: Yes, the settlers.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): Not for the first time the settler threatening him, putting his livestock on Blall's hand.
BLALL: They bring the sheep to grazing in our field. The plan is, it's like to steal our land when they destroyed everything.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): A plan to take his land and farm that he says accelerated when the Gaza war began.
ROBERTSON: All those outposts have been built since October 7th.
BLALL: Yes.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): On this occasion, the settlers getting closer and more aggressive. The day with the cows worse than previous.
BLALL: Touch my cows. Touch my cows. I dare you, I dare you!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What? You'll kill me? You will see what I do. Lower your phone, lower your phones!
BLALL: You threaten me in my house -- Shem Tov? This is my house. This is my house. You cover your face, but we know you.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): The settler whom Blall says he recognizes, claiming God gave him the land.
BLALL: This is my house.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was given it by God -- and Abraham, Isaac, Jacob.
ROBERTSON: When the settlers are here and threatening you, what's going through your mind?
BLALL: I can't explain it, how I'm feeling. It's like broken me.
ROBERTSON: Did you call the police?
BLALL: I called the police. I talked with them. It's like seven minutes.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): Blall says the Israeli police didn't come. They declined to comment to CNN. Things really got ugly after that call.
BLALL: What do you want?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to dance you man.
BLALL: Dance with me?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to dance with you.
BLALL: I am not your bitch!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You are my bitch and you look sweet!
ROBERTSON (voice-over): Then, in Hebrew, he threatens to rape Blall.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (translated text): Rape in the name of God they say. You get what I am saying?
ROBERTSON: According to Israeli media the sort of settler violence that Hamdan Blall experienced has so worried the domestic intelligence chief, the head of Shin Bet, that he wrote to the prime minister warning of Jewish terrorism coming from these hilltop youths and that it was damaging Israel's international standing.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): The rebuke was enough to bring stinging criticism from Netanyahu's right-wing pro settler security minister, Itamar Ben-Gavr, who controls the police. Ben-Gavr called for the intelligence chief to be fired.
Late August, 37-year-old Khalil Salem Ziadeh was laid to rest in Wadi Rahel. He was the second Palestinian to be killed by settlers in the occupied West Bank that month. The U.N. says settlers have killed 12 Palestinians since October 7th last year.
[04:50:00]
On the street where Ziadeh died from settler gunshots, rocks litter the road the Israeli settlement the attackers came from a few hundred yards away. Footage in the Palestinian village captured the moment of the Israeli settler attack.
The question everyone here is asking, how can the settlers get away with the intimidation and the killings?
MUKHTAR AHMED, RELATIVE OF DECEASED: I question Netanyahu and the government of Israel. Why killing?
ROBERTSON (voice-over): And the conclusion they are coming to is that Netanyahu's government feels it can act with impunity.
MUNTHER AMIRA, POPULAR STRUGGLE COORDINATION COMMITTEE: The government is trying to show the international community that they are taking some actions against some settlers, but it was clear yesterday a Palestinian have been killed here. We know that the settlers, the settler who have been, you know, shooting toward our houses.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): Back at Hamdan Blall's farm, I asked Israeli peace activist Shai Parnes, whose group, B'Tselem, released the video of the settler attack why is settler violence up?
SHAI PARNES, B'TSELEM SPOKESPERSON: They just don't hide anything anymore. That's what's really changed.
ROBERTSON: And why don't they hide it anymore?
PARNES: Because this is part of their ideology and they don't care because they see nothing happens to them. They bombard Gaza with tens of thousands of Palestinian casualties and still Israel has total impunity.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): He says he believes authorities know who threatened Blall, a nearby settler, Shem Tov Luski.
ROBERTSON: So, why isn't he arrested?
PARNES: Because that's always Israel policy. Israel policy, state violence and as well as settler violence is to expel Palestinians, make their life miserable and to steal their land.
ROBERTSON: Hi, this is Nic Robertson with CNN. Is this Shem Tov Luski?
ROBERTSON (voice-over): I call Luski.
ROBERTSON: I want to talk to you about the video of you threatening farmer Hamdan Blall and Susir (ph). Was that you?
ROBERTSON (voice-over): At first, he denies it was him.
SHEMTOV LUSKI, SETTLER: No. ROBERTSON: It wasn't you?
LUSKI: It wasn't me.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): I play him the video.
ROBERTSON: You recognize this?
LUSKI: Next time we won't be nice. You understand this. Don't touch me.
ROBERTSON: You recognize this? That's your voice. That's your voice.
LUSKI: OK, it's my voice.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): I want to ask to meet for an interview that he hangs up.
LUSKI: Go f**k yourself.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): I call again
LUSKI: All day long, they're telling the cops I was here. I was there --
ROBERTSON (voice-over): When I ask him to tell me more about his conversations with the police, he changes the subject.
LUSKI: I didn't do anything because I am free and because I didn't do anything wrong to anybody.
ROBERTSON: Shem Tov, listen, we both know this is you. We both know this is you. So, let's sit down and do an interview politely together.
LUSKI: Nic.
ROBERTSON: Yes, sir.
LUSKI: First of all, I don't care what you think. Second of all, I don't care what anybody in your country think of me.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): I ask again to meet him. He wants money.
LUSKI: Five-minute interview, $10,000. OK. OK. Bye-bye.
BLALL: I will die here.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): Blall knows Luski's apparent impunity isn't just putting his land on the line, but his life too.
BLALL: If he will kill you, he will take it. If you accept that, he will take it in any way that you feel in his voice, he has like powerful, big powerful behind him.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): Nic Robertson, CNN, Susya, the occupied West Bank. (END VIDEOTAPE)
[04:55:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: Oh, we're going to show our age difference now because it's not Chrissy's generation, but the reflex to Rio, Duran Duran, one of Britain's most beloved musical acts, so you know.
MACFARLANE: (INAUDIBLE)
FOSTER: Just education here.
Lead singer Simon Le Bon, he was the heartthrob.
MACFARLANE: I love that.
FOSTER: He's been named an official member of the Order of the British Empire.
MACFARLANE: Prince William, no less, awarded him the designation Tuesday for his contributions to music as well as to his charity work. Le Bon is an ambassador for the Blue Marine Foundation, which works to raise awareness on how people can work together to save the ocean.
FOSTER: So not for his music.
MACFARLANE: Get there one way or another.
Now, a rare flower is in bloom in Australia and thousands of people lined up to see and smell it.
FOSTER: Amazingly, the flower rarely blooms, sometimes just once a decade and only up for two days. Thousands of visitors have stopped to catch the whiff.
MACFARLANE: Oh.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think I heard someone say it was a mix between vomit and maybe some dog feces. It's a mimicry at its finest.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I thought it might have been smellier. It wasn't bad.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A little bit of a foot stench.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The rainforest right now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Something you see on an alien movie maybe, but yes, really good.
(END VIDEO CLIP) MACFARLANE: Really good? Why? Why Australia? I don't understand, but this particular plant has been called a so-called bloom watch for years. OK, so they're bloom watches. I understand that's why they might be excited by this.
I, however, am more excited by this. Fans of Bridget Jones are eagerly awaiting the fourth film franchise and the first trailer has just dropped.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's been four years now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're effectively a nun. A very, very naughty nun.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I've set you up on Tinder.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What's Tinder?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MACFARLANE: Renee Zellweger is back in the title role. Now she's a widowed single mother searching for love after the passing of her beloved Mark Darcy, played by actor Colin Firth. Many people are upset by that. Also returning, though, is Hugh Grant.
FOSTER: Hugh Grant and Colin Firth. Could you be more --
MACFARLANE: Still my beating heart.
FOSTER: My wife's very excited about it as well.
MACFARLANE: You've got something of a Hugh Grant with -- Max.
FOSTER: Oh, don't say that.
MACFARLANE: It's a compliment.
FOSTER: Is it?
MACFARLANE: It is a compliment.
FOSTER: Do you not find he plays the same character in 90 percent of his films?
MACFARLANE: He does it so well. He does it so well.
FOSTER: We are speaking to a cliche.
MACFARLANE: I'm very up for having Hugh Grant on the show if he's watching, which he isn't. But anyway, we'll be bringing you that when it releases next year. I'm Christina Macfarlane.
MACFARLANE: I'm Max Foster.
MACFARLANE: Cheer up, Max. [05:00:00]
