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Russia Vows Response to Threats from the West; Removing Fluoride from Water Supply Goes Mainstream; Lyle and Erik Menendez to Appear in Court Today; International Day for Elimination of Violence Against Women. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired November 25, 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]

MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Max Foster. If you're just joining us, here are some of today's top stories.

A cargo plane flying from Germany crashed in Lithuania just outside the Vilnius airport at about 5.30 a.m. local time. Authorities say one crew member was killed, but three others on that flight, including the pilot, actually survived. Emergency workers and firefighters are on the scene.

In Hawkins County, Tennessee, residents are being allowed to return home after evacuating due to a building fire involving unknown chemicals. The fire is burning about 60 miles northeast of Knoxville.

And in just a few hours, G7 foreign ministers will be meeting in central Italy. This comes as the fighting in the Middle East and Ukraine intensifies. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is attending the meetings.

We go to CNN's Fred Pleitgen now in Moscow. Fred, we're still seeing Russian troops being sent to the front lines and more rhetoric as well from the Kremlin.

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, you're absolutely right. And first of all, in great numbers, Russians are still going to the front lines. But also, as far as the rhetoric is concerned, the spokesman for the Kremlin, Dmitry Peskov, at several stages during the weekend, said that the Russians actually believe that they are reacting to escalation coming from the West, obviously meaning the use of ATACMS missiles by the Ukrainians, of course, other Western-supplied missiles as well.

And it was quite interesting because this morning, the deputy foreign minister came out and seemed to indirectly threaten that there could be a military response against Western countries as well, saying that Russia has, as he put it, legitimate security interests, that it is willing to ensure, as he also put it, by any means.

Now, all this comes, as we've seen over the weekend, really the front lines heating up all across the Ukraine, where the Russians apparently now also on the southern front, on the offensive as well. Here's what we're learning. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PLEITGEN (voice-over): As the war in Ukraine nears the three-year mark, more and more Russians are signing up to fight. Vladimir Putin saying more than 700,000 are currently stationed in and around Ukraine. He got rare access to an event in Moscow honoring the mothers of Russian soldiers battling in what the Kremlin still calls its special military operation. Mothers whose sons are fighting have been killed or injured.

Oksana Medvedeva's son Yegor was severely wounded on the battlefield earlier this year.

IKSANA MEDVEDEVA, MOTHER OF RUSSIAN SOLDIER (through translator): He had surgery on his leg and the nerves had to be sewn back together, she says. He also had surgery on his jaw, but it still has not recovered properly. He's still being treated. I am proud of my son that he is such a hero.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Donetsk is a people's republic. Victory will be ours!

PLEITGEN (voice-over): While the Russians have been making significant battlefield gains recently, they appear to come at a heavy price. Moscow doesn't publish casualty figures, but Western governments believe the attrition rate among Russian forces is significant.

To increase manpower, the U.S. and Ukraine say more than 11,000 North Korean troops are now also on Moscow's side, mostly in Russia's Kursk region.

Yelena Yemelina's son Mikhail is still fighting in Ukraine. She won't say where but acknowledges for him it's tough.

YELENA YEMELINA, MOTHER OF RUSSIAN SOLDIER (through translator): He went through a lot of moments he doesn't like to talk about, she says, but I found out by chance I think he's a true hero.

PLEITGEN: The U.S. and its allies continue to condemn Russia's president, urging him to withdraw from Ukraine immediately. But this week instead, a major escalation.

After the Biden administration allowed Ukraine to use longer-distance U.S. and U.K.-supplied missiles to strike deep inside Russia, Putin hit back with a new intermediate-range ballistic missile capable of delivering devastating nuclear warheads, and he threatened to hit U.S. assets as well.

We consider ourselves entitled to use our weapons against the military objects of those countries that allowed their weapons to be used against our objects, he said.

Back at the event for the soldiers' mothers, a Russian parliamentarian backing Putin up.

[04:35:00] NINA OSTANINA, RUSSIAN PARLIAMENT MEMBER (through translator): We are a strong country and we've been patient for a very long time, she said, but in the case of mass deaths of our people, if the collective West does not sober up, we should proceed to more decisive actions. We can no longer lose any of our men.

PLEITGEN (voice-over): But for now, the battles continue to escalate and the losses continue to mount. As Vladimir Putin warns, the war is increasingly becoming a struggle between Russia and the West.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PLEITGEN (on camera): And certainly, it seems the battles have been escalating through the entire course of the weekend, Max. The Russians now saying that they're putting on the full court press in their own Kursk region, of course, were there trying to push Ukrainian forces out of there. But also if we look at the region in the east of Ukraine, the Pokrovsk region, the Russians certainly exerting a lot of pressure on the Ukrainian forces there.

And one of the things that we've been hearing earlier this morning is that the front line that apparently has been dormant for quite a while right now, also heating up in the south of the country, that of course was where in the summer of 2023, the Ukrainians conducted their own counteroffensive, which didn't yield very much in the way of territory, but certainly put some pressure on the Russians at that time.

FOSTER: When that missile, the intermediate missile you were talking about in the report, was first fired, you know, we didn't fully understand what it meant, but a few days on, how would you contextualize that? What does it mean?

PLEITGEN: Yes, I think for the Russians, it's extremely important. It's quite interesting to have seen the messaging around all of this throughout the entire course of the weekend, because there wasn't very much talk about it after it happened in the West. But certainly it was a big deal here in Russia.

The missile, of course, called Areshnik, the Russians saying it's a new type of intermediate range ballistic missile. But we can see some of the things on our screen of some of those projectiles that struck the city of Dnipro. And certainly that missile has massive capability, also nuclear capability as well, even though the Russians are saying they're using it in a non-nuclear configuration.

And the Russians are saying that this was a direct message from Russian President Vladimir Putin after the Ukrainians were granted the possibility to use those ATACMS, U.S. supplied surface-to-surface missiles, and of course, also the U.K. supplied Storm Shadows, that the Russians are very serious about not wanting that to happen and are sending a clear message that this is something that could change the very nature of the conflict to one that is directly between the West and Russia.

And certainly the use of these weapons, I think the Russians trying to show the capabilities that they could unleash.

It was also interesting to see, because we were monitoring all this very closely on Friday evening as well, Max, when the Russian President Vladimir Putin came out very late on Friday, saying that the Russians would continue to test such weapons. It is, of course, still in an experimental stage, and they would continue to test them on the battlefield. That, of course, some pretty tough news for the Ukrainians -- Max.

FOSTER: Yes, absolutely. Fred Pleitgen, thank you.

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. But Donald Trump's pick to lead the Health and Human Services Department, Robert Kennedy Jr., has said he wants to remove fluoride on day one. CNN's Nick Watt has more on the debate over fluoride.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

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

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

STUART COOPER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, FLUORIDE ACTION NETWORK: They were criticized. They were ridiculed. They were called conspiracy theorists. They were called tin foil hatters.

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

STERLING HAYDEN, ACTOR, "DR. STRANGELOVE": Do you realize the fluoridation is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous communist plot we have ever had to face?

WATT (voiceover): 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 I.Q. 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.

And it was RFK Jr. who was just tapped to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL-ELECT: I'm going to let him go wild on health.

WATT (voiceover): And on fluoride?

ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR., TRUMP'S PICK TO LEAD DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES: It causes loss I.Q. It causes developmental injuries.

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

KENNEDY: There is no vaccine that is safe and effective.

WATT (voiceover): Not true.

And this --

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

WATT (voiceover): Also not true.

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

[04:40:00]

DR. JOHNNY JOHNSON JR., PRESIDENT, AMERICAN FLUORIDATION 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: Did 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, the person with a neurological disorder was -- it was exclusively caused by fluoride.

JOHNSON: And they'll take the science and cherry pick tidbits out of it. They 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 (voiceover): 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 science, and I think that fluoride will disappear.

WATT: 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)

FOSTER: The chairman of the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee, Mark Warner, says the U.S. is now witnessing the worst telecom hack in the nation's history. People briefed on the matter tell CNN that Chinese hackers have been spying on some of the most senior figures in both the Democratic and Republican parties. An all-Senators briefing on the situation is now scheduled for December 4th.

CNN's Sean Lyngaas is following the latest developments.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SEAN LYNGAAS, CNN CYBERSECURITY REPORTER: U.S. officials on Friday summoned top telecommunications executives to the White House to share the latest intelligence on an alleged Chinese hacking campaign that has targeted senior U.S. political figures, including President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President-elect J.D. Vance.

The hacking campaign is shaking up to be one of the biggest national security challenges facing the incoming Trump administration. But the full scope of the hack, who it affects, and its impact on national security are still being investigated.

The meeting comes as U.S. cyber experts are still trying to make sure that the hackers have been actually kicked out of the telecom networks. It's a cat-and-mouse game that won't be ending anytime soon. China has denied involvement.

Sean Lyngaas, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOSTER: The Menendez brothers, who were convicted for the murder of their parents, head back to court for the first time in years. What to expect at today's hearing just ahead.

[04:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FOSTER: The Menendez brothers will face a judge today as they fight to be released from prison decades after being convicted of killing their parents. The case has drawn renewed public interest since the release of a hit Netflix show this year with growing support for Lyle and Erik Menendez from celebrities.

CNN's Camila Bernal has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CAMILA BERNAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This status hearing is the latest step in the brothers' bid to freedom after the Los Angeles County District Attorney recommended their re-sentencing. It is the first time that we'll see them in nearly 30 years after they were convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the killing of their parents.

And it is nearly 30 years later that this judge will also decide what happens, whether they appear in person or virtually. It is likely that they will appear virtually. And it is a hearing that will start at 10.30 a.m. at a Van Nuys courtroom here in Los Angeles area.

The judge also setting very strict rules around what happens in this hearing. There will be no cameras and no cell phone. In fact, the cell phones will be sealed in bags. Journalists will be allowed to attend, but only 16 members of the public will be allowed in that courtroom and they will get their seats via a lottery.

There is huge attention and interest in this case, especially after a 2023 docuseries on Peacock, where a member of the boy band Menudo also alleged that he was a victim of sexual abuse by Jose Menendez, the father of the two brothers. So that, along with a letter that Erik Menendez wrote before the killings describing the sexual abuse is what the defense team says should be used and is why they are asking a court to reconsider the sentence and the conviction.

And so the district attorney here in Los Angeles agreed with the defense. The problem for the defense is that that district attorney was essentially voted out of office. Nathan Hochman, the incoming district attorney here in Los Angeles, sees this case a little bit different. Here's what he told us.

NATHAN HOCKMAN, LOS ANGELES COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY-ELECT: Now, as to whether or not I'm going to support that particular motion or not, you've got to do the hard work to make that decision. You've got to review thoroughly the facts in the law. You need to actually speak to the prosecutors, speak to law enforcement officers, speak to the defense council, and speak to any victim family members as well.

Only after I do all that work will I be in a position to weigh in on the Menendez case, because then I'm not only going to weigh in on it, I'll have to defend that decision in court.

BERNAL: And the question here is not whether the brothers killed their parents. They have admitted to doing so but have said that they did it in self-defense after years of sexual abuse, emotional and physical abuse. The prosecution at the time argued that this was premeditated and that the brothers did this for the money and because they wanted their parents' money.

So again, we'll have to wait and see what the judge on Monday decides to do. But there is also another hearing that we're waiting for that is scheduled for December 11th, and that is the sentencing hearing, which could be more consequential for these brothers as this case continues to move through the courts.

Camila Bernal, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOSTER: In Spain, four men have been convicted in connection with the homophobic murder of a 24-year-old nursing assistant. They were found guilty of targeting the victim, Samuel Luis, because they assumed he was gay. Luis's death sparked protests across Spain and abroad. He died after being assaulted outside a nightclub three years ago. The prosecutions are requesting jail terms between 22 and 27 years.

[04:50:00]

A disturbing report is underscoring why marking the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women today is more important than ever. According to the U.N., last year a woman was killed every 10 minutes by a partner or family member.

People are taking to the streets to show support for the cause and anger at the shocking statistics. The report shows that globally 85,000 women and girls were killed intentionally in 2023. Much of the violence against women and girls happens in the home. 60 percent of all female homicides are committed by intimate partners or family members, with 140 women and girls on average losing their lives to domestic violence every day. Now U.N. Women is calling for accountability and action from decision makers.

After the break of blockbuster weekend at the box office, we'll tell you who landed in first place. Wicked or was it Gladiator II?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FOSTER: Now, Hollywood is seeing green thanks to November blockbusters. The box office got the one-two punch it needed this weekend with the debut of Gladiator II and the long-awaited film adaptation of Wicked. David Daniel runs down the weekend's top five films.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVID DANIEL, CNN Senior PRODUCER FOR ENTERTAINMENT NEWS (voice-over): Venom The Last Dance fell to fifth place, grabbing $4 million for a domestic total of $134 million. Bonhoeffer, about the German pastor who worked to overthrow the Nazi regime, opened in fourth place with $5.1 million. Red One dropped to third place, collecting $13.3 million for a 10-day domestic total of $53 million.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I remember that day.

DANIEL (voice-over): Gladiator II entered the box office fray in second place, starting strong with $55.5 million.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, you're green. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I am.

DANIEL (voice-over): A magical debut for Wicked, which topped the chart with $114 million, the biggest opening ever for an adaptation of a Broadway musical.

In Hollywood, I'm David Daniel.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOSTER: Millions of turkeys will be consumed across the U.S. this Thanksgiving Thursday, but two birds will be spared. And that'll be by President Joe Biden. They are called Peach and Blossom. Not sure which one's which. They were introduced on Sunday as this year's national Thanksgiving turkeys, and they're set for their official presidential pardon at the White House in the coming hours. Peach and Blossom will then retire at a farm in Minnesota. So they're the stars of the day.

The City of Light is a little brighter now, thanks to the annual Christmas lights display along Paris' Champs-Elysees Avenue. Look at that. 400 trees are adorned with LED lights in the shape of wine glasses, possibly to encourage some festive cheer. The lights will glitter every night until midnight through to the new year.

Thanks for joining me here on CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Max Foster in London. CNN "THIS MORNING" up next after the break.