Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Putin Warns There Is No Means Of Intercepting His New Missile; New Picks Announced For Key White House Roles; WH: National Security Officials Meet With Telecom Execs To Discuss Chinese Cyber-Espionage Campaign; Removing Fluoride From Water Supply Goes Mainstream; Defense Rests In Daniel Penny Subway Chokehold Trial. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired November 23, 2024 - 17:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:01:23]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: You are in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington.

We begin this hour regarding developments in Russia's war in Ukraine. After a week of escalation in the fighting, many of the players are looking to the near future when in less than 60 days, President-Elect Donald Trump will take office here in the U.S.

Ukrainian President Zelenskyy said today he is awaiting Trumps proposals in January to potentially end the war with Russia. It has been more than a thousand days since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 22.

Trump has previously claimed that he could end the war on day one in office. So far, he's provided no details on how he would do so.

President Putin of Russia is saying his country will continue to test and start mass-producing the hypersonic ballistic missile it fired at Ukraine this week. The missile, which contained multiple warheads, struck the Ukrainian city of Dnipro.

CNN's Nick Paton Walsh is in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv.

Nick, tell us what more you're learned from Ukrainian officials about this missile and its capabilities. Because every time I see the video of it striking, just the speed that those warheads came down, it just looks potentially devastating.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY EDITOR: Yes, I mean look, this is clearly something, I think it's fair to say, that is new, that has not been used on the battlefield, certainly in Ukraine before.

It's a multi-warhead ballistic missile. And the streaks you see coming down from the sky are essentially those separate warheads hitting in that instance, an industrial site in Dnipro.

The Ukrainian most recent assessment is they believe this was the Kedaara (ph) intermediate range missile. And they think that this is a prototype that Russia they say thank God believe had two of as of October.

So it may indeed be that we don't see it used again and this was a show of Russian technological prowess. But it ended essentially a week of quite startling escalation on both sides after the U.S. gave authorization to Ukraine to fire ATACMS longer range missiles into Russia, many felt potentially that Moscow was going to allow that red line to be crossed.

Now, the Kremlin looked to reach for this new device. Whether it's a marked change in its capabilities or not, I think it's unclear but it certainly, I think, spooked many Ukrainian citizens initially assessing this as an ICBM.

There's (ph) no doubt this kind of technology is normally used in nuclear weapons, but I think in this case, Putin is trying to show he has something else. He was able to turn to which he claimed would get through western air defenses, although some analysts say he's mistaken there, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Yes. So many of those weapons they fired are nuclear capable and that, of course, is the concern of NATO allies.

I want to ask you, given your latest visit there, and as you're there, there's a Gallup poll out recently that showed that the Ukrainian public support for the President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has dropped. It was around 80 percent at the start of the war. It's dropped to 60 percent.

By the way, in the current environment 60 percent approval is no small thing. But I wonder what you attribute that to. Is that to him personally and his leadership of the country during the war? Does it reflect rather an exhaustion with the war and Ukrainians want wanting to see some sort of light at the end of the tunnel?

WALSH: Look, I think it's fair to say that President Zelenskyy has sort of been the face of Ukraine's resistance since the Russian invasion.

[17:04:46]

WALSH: And as you pointed out yourself, 60 percent, I think any western leader would kill for that. But yes, this is clearly the drop there, a reflection of how nearly three years of fighting here has taken an extraordinary toll on nearly every Ukrainian household.

And Ukraine is, you know, suffering from a manpower shortage because of the extent of the losses which they often keep classified in terms of a clean figure out on a battlefield.

And it is a war I think, where the defined victory of Zelenskyy is a maximalist goal. He initially wanted to kick Russia out of all Ukrainian territory, even Crimea.

I think even the most staunch western allies thought that might have been on the outskirts of realistic. But still now there is, I think, increased pressure upon him to find some sort of resolution to this conflict.

But an increased paradox, really, in that I think most western allies, while potentially hoping to see some sort of negotiated end to this. I don't think there's an endless appetite in NATO to supply assistance to Ukraine.

There is a broad recognition that Moscow could use what Ukraine might refer to as an unjust peace, to refit, to regroup and then potentially push further into Ukrainian territory when maybe they see a lack of resolve on the part of the west.

So Zelenskyy is in an exceptionally tight spot. His key backer, the U.S., is about to have a president-elect who has said he can end the conflict in 24 hours and seems both very keen on negotiating a settlement and abnormally sympathetic towards Vladimir Putin's point of view.

And he has a population here who are suffering deeply with essentially the NATO perspective being here. They just hope Ukraine can hold out as long as possible until Russia eventually breaks in its war effort.

So an exceptionally tough job and still opinion polls, I think slipping. Yes, because it's three years now, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Yes. just a tremendous human cost of that war too including many civilians.

Nick Paton Walsh live in Kyiv, thanks so much.

Joining us now, Ian Bremmer, president of the Eurasia Group and GZERO Media. Ian, it's good to have you on.

You know, there's this -- there's this discussion of a negotiated end of the war. Certainly, President-Elect Trump has talked about it and has said that he could -- he could just make it happen.

You have the Ukrainian president now saying, absolutely, we make a fair deal. I would love to end the war in this country.

But it was interesting. I noted that Senator Mike Rounds Republican, speaking at the Halifax Security Forum. He said the following.

He said, "As much as I would like to believe we can negotiate with a tyrant," he's referring to Putin here, "I suspect we may be deceiving ourselves."

And I wonder that -- that's the question I have. Does Putin want to come to a negotiated end to this war? He's making progress in the east. He's punishing the Ukrainian civilian population. And he might calculate that a Trump in office is less likely to sustain Ukraine's defense than a Kamala Harris would have been.

IAN BREMMER, PRESIDENT, EURASIA GROUP: Well, he certainly calculates that taking a more maximalist position over the next two months and portraying a failed Biden policy in Putin's perspective as making World war III much more dangerous gives Trump more ammunition, both to say that, look, I'm the guy that's ending this war, but also potentially accept terms that are much more acceptable to Putin than they would be to the Ukrainians or to the Europeans.

That's what Putin is trying to accomplish right now with these new weapons. That's what he's doing, I suspect, with the sabotage that we don't have hard evidence.

But it's pretty clear it wasn't an accident that occurred on this fiber line between Germany and Finland. That's what we're seeing from the new nuclear doctrine enshrining into law whatever that means for the Russians, that they are now essentially at war directly with the United States, with the U.K., that anyone that is commissioning weapons to strike Russian territory directly.

SCIUTTO: Next question, next topic is NATO. I actually have two questions regarding NATO here.

It was notable that the NATO chief, the new NATO chief, of course, he traveled to Florida to meet with President-Elect Trump on Friday.

I know you're heard this. I had several of Trump's former senior advisers from his first administration tell me that they believe Trump will pull the U.S. out of NATO or attempt to, or at least reduce America's participation in NATO, maybe even refuse to enforce NATO's Article 3 mutual defense requirement or commitment, rather, with its NATO allies.

Do you believe that to be true? Do you believe it's a real risk that Trump at one end -- the extreme end attempt to leave NATO or at least reduce American participation?

BREMMER: Yes, the Article 5 commitments. Yes, I think --

SCIUTTO: Article 5, yes.

(CROSSTALK)

BREMMER: I don't believe -- I don't believe, Jim, that Trump is likely to go that far for a couple of reasons.

First, because he will take credit for the fact that NATO is stronger today than it was when he first became president, and that NATO allies are spending a lot more money. More of that is because of the Putin invasion of Ukraine than it is because Trump pushed them.

[17:09:52]

BREMMER: But Trump actually does matter here and I think he wants to show that as a win. And you'd seen that recently.

Mike Waltz just put -- the incoming -- the appointed national security advisor has said, yes, we want to make NATO stronger. And that means everybody has to commit. Everyone has to commit the level that's commensurate to their -- the size of their comparative economy. Well, Poland is doing that. The Baltics are doing that. The Nordics

are doing that. In other words, all the frontline countries in NATO that are there really concerned about Russia are actually contributing more than their share, not only directly to their own defense as Trump wants, but also to Ukraine.

They're supporting Ukraine to a greater degree compared to the size of their economy than the United States is. So that's already happening. He can claim that as a win.

Secondly, you may remember, Jim, and this is kind of interesting because Trump very rarely admits he makes mistakes. First foreign policy issue I've ever seen him admit he made a mistake was on NATO. When he was running for president, he said "obsolete, not so useful".

He becomes president and then says, well, you know, I was a real estate guy. I didn't really know anything about security policy. I talked to my great, beautiful generals and they explained to me why it's important. Now, I don't think its obsolete.

I would honestly be surprised if in the first months of his presidency, if there were to be something that felt like an existential threat for the Americans pulling out.

Now, the danger is that he gives away too much to Russia and that a bunch of NATO allies say ok, we're with -- we're with Trump on this, and other NATO allies say, no we're not.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

BREMMER: That is the problem, that the Europeans might split.

SCIUTTO: Exactly. That'd be -- that was the concern. In fact, that was Putin's calculation at the invasion. He thought that Europe would split. It didn't. It stayed together. NATO stayed together. In fact, it expanded, as you know, adding Sweden and Finland.

So let me ask you the next question.

BREMMER: Yes.

SCIUTTO: And you hear a difference of opinion on this in Europe as well. Would Putin ever test the NATO alliance, test Article 5 by attacking a NATO ally?

Because when you speak to the -- to the forward-facing NATO countries, the leaders of the Baltics, for instance, they say, absolutely. If he thinks he could get away with it, he will do it.

But you speak to others, Secretary Blinken, they will say, no way. He knows that NATO is just too formidable an adversary.

BREMMER: He is testing NATO commitments and attacking NATO countries every day. He's doing it through cyberattacks. He's doing it through critical infrastructure attacks. He's doing it on Telegram with his spies paying for people to engage in vandalism and acts of arson. There was an attempted assassination against the CEO of the leading German defense company.

Absolutely.

Now, that is not an invasion -- a kinetic invasion of a NATO state. Would he be willing to ever test that. And I would say he's much more willing to do that if NATO starts to divide. If the United States is firmly on the side of Hungary, a Slovakia, an Italy, a Germany. And meanwhile the Balts and the Nordics and France are saying, no, we really don't support what Trump is doing and we need to stick much more strongly with the Ukrainians, not accept the Russian position.

He might be willing to test that. I don't think he would start by testing it with tanks rolling across the border. But might he shoot down a plane? Might he engage in far more aggressive military exercises? Could there be an accident in the Baltic Sea. For example they could kill some sailors.

I mean, the kind of thing that we worry about for example, with Taiwan over the Chinese boarding, inspecting vessels, that kind of thing. Sure.

Especially if he thinks that Trump is in a really different position than the Baltic states. I mean, at the end of the day, you know, Lithuania you're going to have to show Trump on a map. This is Lithuania, and he's going to say it's this big and it's this far away, and we're doing this why?

So I think, look, I mean, you and I speak to a lot of leaders from that part of the world. They feel this is an existential threat in a way that the Americans absolutely do not.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

BREMMER: Neither the Democrats nor the Republicans, but particularly President Trump. So this is going to be a very serious concern of theirs going forward.

SCIUTTO: Yes. The question being is Article 5 real, right? And does Putin try to attempt to test our definition of what an attack that would trigger Article 5 is. You know, tanks might be one thing, but as you say, you know, you sink a ship with plausible deniability, then you wonder.

Ian Bremmer, thanks so much for joining us.

BREMMER: Thanks, Jim.

This just in. President Elect Trump has announced a new cabinet position just moments ago.

We're going to take you to Mar-a-Lago next for that update.

[17:14:39]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) SCIUTTO: President-Elect Trump just announced his choice for secretary of Agriculture. That choice: Brooke Rollins, a Trump loyalist, head of the conservative group America First Policy Institute. Trump still has several other cabinet positions to fill.

Last night, the president-elect announced several new picks, including hedge fund manager Scott Bessent to lead the Treasury.

CNN's Alayna Treene is live outside Mar-a-Lago in West Palm Beach.

[17:19:46]

SCIUTTO: So tell us, when we look at the picks together, what kind of policies is the president intending to carry out here? Because he described some quite far-right positions during the campaign.

You, of course, have Project 2025 floating around which he has claimed to have no knowledge of, but several of the authors of that are now going to be in his cabinet. Do we get a vision as to what are the major changes he wants to make while in office?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I think we absolutely do, Jim.

And there's a couple key things, I think to look at. One is that -- and Donald Trump has said this -- but it's very clear with his picks that this is something he wants to be carried out, which is he wants more control as president.

There are agencies, the Department of Justice, for example that he announced. Well, his new attorney general pick is Pam Bondi. That is one agency that traditionally has, you know independence from the president, from -- its part of the executive branch but, you know, try to operate on its own.

Donald Trump wants to do away with that. And that's really to say, for many of the agencies under the executive branch. He wants them to really help him expand his power.

We saw yesterday he announced that Russell Vought will be his new budget director. He is someone, a key author of Project 2025, who kind of made that clear as well in his offerings in that conservative blueprint that he wants to really expand the power that the commander- in-chief has. So that's one key thing.

I think another thing as well is that what he wants to do as it relates to tariffs. He is implementing people who -- people like Scott Bessent for treasury but also Brooke Rollins now his latest announcement to run the Department of Agriculture. Those are two roles where they will likely have a big impact on tariffs.

But they're also loyalists. I mean, that's really the case for many of these picks, if not all of them that he has announced to lead his cabinet with. All people who have been loyal to Donald Trump, who have had long-standing relationships with him, who stood by him in the aftermath of January 6th after he had departed the White House and many people had distanced themselves. He has people who he's putting into his administration who he really wants to not get in his way, to help him move forward with his policy goals, and to really carry out the promises that he made on the campaign trail. Jim.

SCIUTTO: And a lot of them, with a lot of experience on television, too. That always seems to be a factor in his choices.

Alayna Treene at Mar-a-Lago, thanks so much.

So let's speak to our political panel now. Republican strategist Brad Todd and Democratic strategist Maria Cardona.

Good to have you both on.

Maria, I'm going to give you the chance to start on this because, as you know, the president staked out some very extreme positions during the campaign.

It's a bit of a smorgasbord in the in the cabinet. I mean, you have some quite predictable ones and, let's be frank, some quite extreme choices here.

Sebastian Gorka -- I mean, there were folks who pushed him out of his last administration because some of the positions he took. He's going to be back on the NSC.

But you look at the person who's going to lead the Labor Department. Pro-union, surprisingly pro-union, given some of the president-elect's stances.

The treasury secretary, he worked with George Soros, which, as you know, has been a favorite punching bag of the right and remains that way.

When you look at this cabinet, Maria Cardona, is it as extreme right as you were concerned about going into this election?

MARIA CARDONA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: It is, Jim, and it is for one reason. And Alayna actually alluded to this very clearly, which is the person in charge is none of those people, none of the picks. It's Donald Trump.

And the one thread that is very much in common through all of his nominees is that they are loyalists. This is how they are described in every single reporting that we have about who they are and what their background is.

So the other thing that is very concerning is except for a few, most of them have zero experience, have zero expertise, have zero background in the themes and in the issues and in the matter that they're going to be heading up at whatever agency or at whatever group they are designated to lead.

And so it goes back to what Trump promised on the campaign trail. He promised these extreme moves, these extreme policies. He wants to blow up the government. He wants to get rid of norms. He wants to get rid of institutions.

He wants to fire 50,000 government workers, civil servants. He wants to do exactly what was in Project 2025.

The most concerning pick so far is the one at OMB who is the author of Project 2025, who is going to be the one, really, that is going to give Trump the power to do exactly what he wants to do.

And that's not even talking about the ones who have been picked, who have gross, disgusting, sexual allegations against them.

I mean, this is a cabinet of chaos, and that's what we're going to be seeing from him.

[17:24:47]

SCIUTTO: Brad, I want to give you a chance to respond to that because it is true that Donald Trump's own public statements and the statements of folks who are now serving in his cabinet, they have vowed to carry out quite drastic changes in government.

Do you look at this cabinet as fitting that bill, in effect?

BRAD TODD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, let's unpack a few things Maria mentioned there and even going back to something Alayna said. Of course, the cabinets are full of loyalists. Every cabinet is full of loyalists.

Joe Biden didn't have anyone in his cabinet who was disloyal to Joe Biden. That's not the way it's done.

And you know, as far as experience I mean Linda McMahon has already been in somebody else's administration, his. President Trump's. She ran a different department.

You have governors, you have former attorney general Pam Bondi, who was the lead law enforcement officer for one of our largest states.

You have a lot of people who have held, then would have been highly qualified in anybody else's cabinet.

Also, Donald Trump's pick Democrats, he's picked a pro-labor secretary of Labor who the Teamsters have endorsed, Randi Weingarten has endorsed.

(CROSSTALK)

TODD: One of the Republicans -- see when is -- when is has a Republican president ever done anything labor likes at the Department of Labor? I think he's not getting near enough credit from my colleagues on the right, like Maria, for doing some pretty surprising moves here as far as the diversity of thought.

SCIUTTO: Well, the question will come in the moves that they make, right, and the policies that they carry out.

CARDONA: Right.

SCIUTTO: I want to ask if I can, Maria, about a couple of specific choices. One -- and, Brad, I'm curious about your thoughts on this too, because one of the picks that I hear the most concerns about from Republicans, mind you, as well as Democrats, is Tulsi Gabbard at DNI.

And that's not just an experience question. And we should note that previous directors of National Intelligence, they led intelligence agencies, right, for years prior to becoming the senior-most U.S. intelligence official.

But it's about positions, public positions that Tulsi Gabbard has expressed that are contradictory to America's bipartisan national security positions, like for instance a very basic one, who's responsible for Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

I wonder Maria Cardona, just briefly, do you think she should be DNI? And if not, why not?

And then, Brad, I'll go to you for your response.

CARDONA: Absolutely not. And we have heard this not from Democrats, but from Republicans themselves. You have Tulsi Gabbard, who completely eviscerates Tulsi Gabbard's past talking points, her past comments, her past cozying up to Assad, to Putin.

And it's not that we shouldn't be talking to our adversaries, that actually should be done, but it shouldn't be done by somebody who is designated and has a diplomatic background and permission to do that.

That is not what Tulsi gabbard did when she went to see Assad and cozied up to him and agreed with him. And she came back to say that she agreed with him and that it's the United States' fault that Ukraine was attacked. And that she didn't believe that Assad had used the weapons of mass destruction, chemical weapons against his own people.

Why would Republicans, why would Trump choose somebody who is saying things against the United States as the highest person who's going to be in charge of our intelligence? I just don't understand that.

SCIUTTO: So Brad, what's your answer?

TODD: You know, Jim, it wasn't too long ago Tulsi Gabbard was the darling of the Democratic Party. She was one of the most heralded freshman congressmen. She ran for president as a Democrat just five years ago.

Democrats were quick to heap praise on Tulsi Gabbard until she endorsed Donald Trump.

SCIUTTO: No. Not when she went to Syria.

(CROSSTALK)

SCIUTTO: Not when she went to Syria, Brad. No one, no one praised the trip to Syria.

TODD: She's going -- she's going to have a hearing. Republicans are going to ask her legitimated questions about that and her answers will decide whether she's confirmed or not.

I mean, I think that a lot of Republican hawks will have tough questions for her.

You saw Jim Risch has already indicated he has some questions for her. Lisa Murkowski has indicated she has questions for her. But once again, I think the hypocrisy from Democrats who have long praised people until they supported Donald Trump is pretty rich.

CARDONA: No.

SCIUTTO: Fact check there because they did criticize her. I just -- I just handle it because we do have to go. They certainly criticized her when she went to Syria and criticized her when she blamed NATO for the -- for the Russian invasion.

TODD: I think she'll get questioned on that. I think she's going to have to explain that.

SCIUTTO: All right.

Well, listen, I didn't mean to just zero in on one because there are many cabinet picks. But boy, we've got a long time to go until January. So we'll have you back and discuss more of them.

Brad Todd, Maria Cardona --

CARDONA: Thanks Jim.

SCIUTTO: Happy Thanksgiving to both of you.

CARDONA: You too.

TODD: Thanks a lot.

SCIUTTO: Coming up next. One senator calls it the biggest hack of U.S. telecommunications in U.S. history. What we know about a massive Chinese infiltration to spy on top U.S. officials.

[17:29:43]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:34:09]

SCIUTTO: More details now of a major Chinese hack. U.S. national security officials met Friday with telecommunications executives to discuss mounting concerns over a Chinese espionage campaign, which targeted senior U.S. officials.

Officials have become increasingly concerned about the potential damage posed to U.S. national security after Chinese hackers used telecom firms to spy on phone calls and text messages.

China, as it often does when confronted with allegations such as this, has denied them.

Joining us now to discuss the extent, CNN political and national security analyst, and author of the book, "New Cold Wars, China's Rise, Russia's Invasion, and Americas Struggle to Defend the West, David Sanger, also works for a little paper called the "New York Times," wrote a piece on this hack.

Good to have you on, David. Thanks so much for joining.

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL & NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Thank you, Jim.

Yes, it really is a remarkable story. And I think remarkable, in some ways, because it went undetected --

[17:35:05]

SCIUTTO: Yes.

SANGER: -- for more than a year.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

SANGER: And that seems pretty astounding given the sophistication of the targets.

SANGER: No question. I mean, it reminds me of previous hacks, even by Russia, where that was the issue.

For instance, going back to the State Department hack. That they got into the system, that's one breach. But that the breach was not detected for so long.

And, you know, you've reported on this. This has been happening for years, right? So, so the defenses are up.

SANGER: Yes.

SCIUTTO: But China got around the defenses and no one knew. How did this happen?

SANGER: Well, first of all, you're right, the defenses were up. You know, it was nearly -- it was more than a decade ago, Jim, that Unit 61398 of the People's Liberation Army was inside American companies.

And then, of course, there was the cleaning out of the Office of Personnel Management, which lost 22 million security files. You know, these are what people file when they are getting ready to get a security clearance. All kinds of detail.

So you would have thought everyone would have been on their toes here.

The problem, Jim, is that the American telecommunications system is this hodgepodge of old and new equipment, some of it 40 years old, much of it unpatchable.

And the Chinese did a brilliant job of working the seams, getting inside it, and then heading for the crown jewels, which in this case was the system that enables the government to put lawful wiretaps on suspected criminals or spies, including the FISA system, the federal -- you know intelligence surveillance system.

So they would have a chance to look at whether the U.S. was following, for example, Chinese spies.

SCIUTTO: That stood out to me. And I'm going to quote your own story to you, which I'm sure you love when folks do that.

SANGER: Yes. Always have.

SCIUTTO: But you said that, "This hack practically gives a roadmap to discover which Chinese spies the U.S. had identified and which it had missed."

This reminds me, and you remember this, more than a decade ago, but when China uncovered Americas spies, a whole network of them, actually went on, sadly, to -- to kill some of those American spies.

SANGER: Yes.

SCIUTTO: But this this is obviously about U.S. discovery of Chinese spies. But if they know -- if they knew who we knew were spies, I mean, that -- that is debilitating for the U.S. intelligence community, isn't it?

SANGER: Well, that's right. And you know, you've written extensively on where this fits into China's, you know, overall goals.

And first of all, this is exactly the kind of hack that China and the United States regularly carry out on each other.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

SANGER: And we should -- you know, we're all grownups here. The United States does this to Chinese telecommunications systems, too. And has done it to Huawei, as we learned during the Snowden revelations.

But the fact that the U.S. was not able to go detect this -- and it might not have been detected now had it not been for some Microsoft researchers who were following this Chinese group, which they had named Salt Typhoon, and saw the I.P. addresses, essentially, you know Internet addresses, of Verizon AT&T, T-Mobile, other customers out there.

SCIUTTO: We just learned, my producer told me in my ear, that there's now an all-Senators classified briefing on this -- this hack scheduled for December.

Before we go, you mentioned the U.S., of course, spies on its adversaries. Should Americans watching this, who are saying, oh, my gosh, China did this, should they assume that the U.S., with all its enormous capabilities, might have been able to pull off something similar on China?

In other words, we, our country, is successfully hacking Chinese systems, or at least to some degree?

SANGER: Well, to some degree, we have. What makes it harder is that China's got a controlled system, right, that's surrounded by the great firewall.

And that U.S. intelligence agencies are not allowed, by law, to look inside the United States. So if this group was launching it's -- its operations from inside the U.S., it wouldn't be able to see them.

And that's why you've got to depend on the telecommunications companies themselves or firms like Microsoft or Mandiant or others to go dig them out. That's one big difference.

SCIUTTO: Yes, yes.

That's trouble. Open society, right? You're more open to attacks like this.

(CROSSTALK)

SCIUTTO: David Sanger, thanks so much.

SANGER: Always great to be with you, Jim.

[17:39:54]

SCIUTTO: We'll have more news when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: For nearly 80 years, Americans have been drinking water with added fluoride. It's been hailed as one of the greatest health achievements of the 20th century by the CDC. It's a reason for our healthy teeth.

But Trump's pick to lead the Health and Human Services Department, Robert F. Kennedy Jr, has said he wants to remove fluoride from the nation's water on, quote, "day one."

CNN's Nick Watt reports, the comments have reignited a fluoride debate.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NARRATOR: In several Western towns, children rarely got tooth decay. Why? Their drinking water contained fluoride.

NICK WATT, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Ever since we started putting a trace of fluoride in the water, there have been those who say we really shouldn't.

[17:45:00] STUART COOPER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, FLUORIDE ACTION NETWORK: They were criticized. They were ridiculed. They were called conspiracy theorists. They were called tinfoil hatters.

WATT: In 1964's "Dr. Strangelove," this was the sign: Ripper had gone bananas.

UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: Do you realize that fluoridation is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous Communist plot we have ever had to face?

WATT: But fluoride skepticism is now mainstream, according to a "New York Times" headline and a "Washington Post" columnist who now thinks it's not an entirely crazy idea.

Because this recent government report finds, "With moderate confidence, that higher estimated fluoride exposures, more than double the dose in our water, are consistently associated with lower IQ in children. More studies are needed."

And because a federal judge recently ruled there is an unreasonable risk of such injury, a risk sufficient to require the EPA to engage with a regulatory response.

(SHOUTING)

WATT: And because RFK Jr was just tapped to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT-ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm going to let him go wild on health.

WATT: And on fluoride.

ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR, TRUMP NOMINEE FOR SECRETARY OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES: It causes loss of IQ. It causes neuro developmental injuries.

WATT: Worth noting, RFK Jr. has also said this.

KENNEDY: There's no vaccine that is, you know, safe and effective.

WATT: Not true.

And this --

KENNEDY: COVID 19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and Black people.

WATT: Also not true.

The CDC still touts fluoridation as one of the 10 greatest public health achievements of the 20th century.

DR. JOHNNY JOHNSON, JR., PRESIDENT, AMERICAN FLUORIDIAN SOCIETY: At least 25 percent fewer cavities, and as a clinician, I will tell you that it is more like 50 percent. COOPER: If you look into it, you'll realize very quickly that the

science is not on the CDC side.

WATT (on camera): Do you have contact with any people who have been sort of definitively harmed by this -- by fluoride as a child and have suffered neurological impairment?

COOPER: It's hard to tell if that, you know, that person with a neurological disorder whether it was exclusively caused by fluoride.

JOHNSON: They'll take the science and cherry pick tidbits out of it. And take and mix in their opinions, throw it in a blender, and then pour it out over an unsuspecting public.

WATT: We don't know that it causes harm, but we don't know that it definitely doesn't.

JOHNSON: You don't know that it doesn't cause gray hair.

WATT (voice-over): After nearly 80 years of this kind of debate, now might be a turning point.

Inauguration Day, says RFK, the Trump White House will advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from public water.

KENNEDY: I'm going to give them good information about the science, and I think that fluoride will disappear.

WATT (on camera): So RFK Jr and his side of the debate, they're fine with fluoride in toothpaste. That's topically applied. And it's not dosing everybody like it is in the water.

And you know, it's a couple of months before he even takes his new job, before he starts his new job, and RFK Jr is already having an influence.

The past couple of weeks, over a dozen municipalities have voted to stop fluoridating their water.

I listened in to the debate in Winter Haven, Florida. RFK Jr's name came up numerous times. And they voted in favor of stopping putting fluoride in their water.

Nick Watt, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: Well, they better start brushing their teeth more.

When we come back, what's next in the trial of Daniel Penny, the New York man accused of holding someone in a deadly chokehold on a subway. How his defense is disputing the details of what happened that day.

You are in the CNN NEWSROOM

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [17:52:51]

SCIUTTO: The defense has now rested in the Daniel Penny manslaughter trial. He, you may remember, is the Marine veteran charged in the chokehold death of Jordan Neely on board a New York City subway last year.

His defense argued that Neely's death was not just from a chokehold, but that a combination of factors, including Neely's overall health and drug use, played a role.

CNN's Gloria Pazmino is in New York following this.

Tell us what else we heard from the defense this week.

GLORIA PAZMINO, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, that last part you mentioned is critical because what the defense was trying to do was counter much of what the prosecution said for several days, that Neely had died from the chokehold that Daniel Penny put him in. That's what the medicals -- the medical examiners testified to.

So they brought in their own medical expert to counter that and to say instead that Neely died from a complicating factor, including sickle cell disease, the fact that he was on K2 at the time, and that he suffered from mental illness.

Now, the question here is what will the jury think? They are going to be likely starting deliberations following the week after the Thanksgiving holiday.

One critical thing that we were waiting for in this was whether or not Penny was going to take the stand. He decided not to do that in this case.

But we did have a chance to hear directly from Penny during this trial, and that's because there was a piece of evidence that was introduced during the prosecution's case that showed a voluntary interview that Penny did with detectives shortly after the incident.

Take a listen to him describing what happened that day.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED DETECTIVE: How long had he been on there before you intervened?

DANIEL PENNY, CHARGED WITH MANSLAUGHTER: I mean, he got on. He whipped his jacket off. That's -- I mean, usually I don't crack heads, you know what I mean? I just kind of let them do their thing.

But then he started threatening people. Once he starts doing that, that's when you try to subdue him. Yes.

I'm -- I'm not -- I wasn't trying to like injure him. Right? I'm just trying to keep him from hurting anybody else. He's threatening people. That's what you -- that's what we learned in the Marine Corps. That's what you guys learn as -- as cops, as police officers.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[17:55:09]

PAZMINO: So that whole thing he says there where he's not trying to hurt him is key because he is accused of manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide.

The prosecution is not trying to prove that Penny intentionally killed Jordan Neely. So that will be a key detail that this jury will have to consider in the next few days.

We expect Monday for both sides to get to an agreement about how the jury will be charged, and then deliberations will begin in just a matter of days -- Jim?

SCIUTTO: Gloria Pazmino, thanks so much.

Well, over the next few weeks, we will be introducing you to our top- five CNN Heroes. This week's hero has always had a passion for math and engineering.

When she went to study engineering at MIT, she was one of only two black women in her whole class.

Now she is fighting to help make the industry more diverse by bringing STEM and dance together, particularly for young girls.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

YAMILEE TOUSSAINT, CNN HERO: We bring STEM and dance together by allowing the girls to create dance performances that combine the two.

So they can work on costumes that light up as they move. And they're learning how to program the circuit so that when they press a button on the circuit, the lights turn blue or whatever effect that they want to be able to convey a message.

We're going to talk about song structure today.

They can create their own song through computer science and A.I.

So these are the poses in the beginning.

And then be able to make a dance routine to that song that they created.

I love it. This is going to be so fly.

We're normalizing that girls of color can do computer science and create something together.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)