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CNN International: Activists In Spain Protest Lack Of Affordable Housing; Student Protests Over School Conditions Turn Violent; SpaceX Crew Dragon Mission Sets Records. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired October 02, 2026 - 04:30   ET

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

[04:30:00]

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SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to CNN Newsroom. I'm Salma Abdelaziz in London. I want to show you the scene in Madrid, Spain, right now. Protesters have gathered outside -- outside Parliament ahead of a key vote on two royal decrees that are aimed at tackling the housing crisis. The demonstrators are locked in a standoff with authorities as the outcome of the vote remains uncertain.

The two proposals include a ban on evictions of vulnerable tenants and measures to prevent abusive rent hikes, but they still need approval by the lower House, and we're just hours away from that vote. The demonstrations were fueled by last week's dramatic eviction of an 87- year-old woman from her home of more than seven decades. She was facing a staggering 200 percent right -- rent increase.

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PEDRO SANCHEZ, SPANISH PRIME MINISTER (through translator): We must not forget that this whole debate has also arisen because of the failure to act, the inhumanity and the callousness of certain politicians linked to the People's Party who have not lifted a finger in the face of Maricarmen's eviction, and we have provided a response that the regions could have provided, in which the Madrid City Council could undoubtedly have provided, but with which they have refused to provide.

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ABDELAZIZ: Joining me now is Valeria Racu. She is the spokesperson for the Madrid Tenants Union, and she is right by Puerta del Sol, where this huge encampment of protesters has taken place now for days, and Valeria, if I could just start there, can you share with us the atmosphere around you, the people around you, what the feeling and the sense is right now where you are?

VALERIA RACU, SPOKESPERSON, MADRID TENANT'S UNION: Of course. Hi, good morning, everybody. Well, we are about like 300 meters from Puerta del Sol, so we're actually not at the camp-out at the moment because right behind me, what we got is Parliament, right? So today, a very important vote will be taking place in that -- in that building. That building that it's supposed to be legislating and it's supposed

to be creating laws -- laws for like the population and the civil population and for the people who actually maintain this country every single day, and not for speculators who come here and make money and make profit out of our lives, right? The energy in the camp-out is quite high.

We've been camping for almost a week now after those outrageous images we saw last week after Maricarmen's evictions, and we are very much ready to take it further, wherever we need to take it, right? This is about much more than this decree and this bill, housing bill that will be voted today.

[04:35:00]

These are some minimum measures that we should be having in place in Madrid, but everywhere in the world, really because in what moment have we normalized that houses are a business? Houses are for living, not a profit, and we're ready to take it wherever it takes, whether today this housing bill passes or not.

ABDELAZIZ: And Valeria, you know this is an international channel, so I really want to break down what we mean by housing crisis in Spain. I understand that rent has doubled over the last decade. Spain faces a housing deficit of three quarter million homes that could rise to up to 1 million by 2028, and there's only about 120,000 homes that are being built annually.

This is according to your organization, the Madrid Tenants Union. But personalize those numbers for me. What does that mean in terms of a young person just trying to find housing in Spain today?

RACU: Of course, this is not only about young people either, right? This is something that is transgenerational, it's for all the generations. This is also about -- sorry, there's something else going on behind there. This is not only about young people. This is about different generations. As we saw, Maricarmen was 87 years old. This is also about not people in Madrid.

This is happening all around the country. And what has happened is after the economic crash in 2008, we saw all those neoliberal policies who took us there, right? And still, the government decided, the Partido Popular, the right-wing government decided to save the banks, to save the speculators, to save the housing investors, and not save all the people who ended up in the streets.

Afterwards, in 2013, what happened in Spain is that we welcomed international investors, right? The first one to arrive here was Blackstone, actually an international fund, a hedge fund from the U.S. which uses pensions from people in the U.S. right, like from people, firefighters or teachers in the U.S. to evict us here. Ever since then, policies, public policies, have been like very much support in their business, and we made it -- they have made it very easy for them to make a profit.

What does it mean nowadays? That we don't have any kind of stability, right? You cannot plan your life because any time your landlord could tell you that you should leave because they want to raise the rent. It means that our homes are taken by touristic apartments. So, a lot of the offer, -- not a lot of people like to talk about offer on demand to this -- this law. But what we see is that the offer is kidnapped, right? It's kidnapped in empty houses.

It's kidnapped in touristic apartments. It's kidnapped in -- in garbage contracts and garbage leases, right? That don't give stability and that don't give like very minimum rights to people. Rentierism and housing profit, like housing business, is a cancer for Spanish economy and it's a cancer for economists around the world. We know they are organized internationally.

We know that investor funds are making a profit of housing everywhere around the world. This is the -- where most of their money is invested, and we need to organize around it everywhere else. So, I encourage everyone to find their local tenant union and organize against this.

ABDELAZIZ: But the government says it is making changes. As you said, you are standing right in front of Parliament, where they're voting on these two proposals, but you're saying this is not enough. So, what is your demand, and what is the demand of the people behind you? I hear them chanting. What are they calling for today?

RACU: Well, they are chanting, "houses are not for profit." They are also chanting like I use a -- I use this apartment for Maricarmen because we've had a very recent corruption case here where you saw the president of our region of the Comunidad de Madrid, the region -- the Madrid region, has bought, we found out that she has bought like a very luxurious apartment for her, like with like more than 6.7 million.

And this is happening at the same time as Maricarmen was evicted from her home for more than seven decades, and at the same time that in Madrid we were opening a big like investment fair, "The District" that is one of the biggest investment fairs in the world, right?

So, all of this created this energy here. Yes, you're right. These are very minimum measures, and this is -- these are not enough. We still need them to pass, and we're still very much aware that maybe they won't pass today because once again we will see the -- the right parties voting no, right? We've been pushing even for this progressive government that we have in place here in Spain to -- to do this.

They had had this bill on their -- on their table for more than a year and a half, and they haven't done anything about it. So, it wasn't until the streets organized themselves and we went for it all that they saw themselves forced to approve it in a minister cabinet, and today we have to see what -- what the far right that -- sorry not the far right -- what the far -- what the right does.

But you're right. This is not enough. So, what are the biggest -- the biggest ideas we have behind us, right? And the biggest demands. The most important thing is that we need to change the way in which we understand housing, right? Like it has to be a paradigm shift. For too long, we have normalized housing to be a market.

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It cannot be something for -- it cannot have like a social function and an economic function at the same time. These two things cannot work at the same time. If one goes up, the other one goes down. And in this particular moment, we need to change what we have been doing for too long. We have been supporting the economic function and not the social function.

So, we need to change it completely. So, everything we need needs to take us to -- needs to get us closer to taking the housing out of the market, right? So how could we -- how could we see this? For example, with indefinite leases, right? We should have like in the same way that in the labor market, this is something that we have in -- in Spain.

We have indefinite job contracts, right? As long as you do your job well and good, you will have a job. You won't be -- they won't be able to fire you just because you are not profitable enough, right? So, we need the same in housing. We need to have some stability. We need to be able to look forward because an eviction doesn't happen -- doesn't start with the eviction.

It starts with the idea of the landlord that they can get you out of the home to make more money. But then we're also putting on the table other demands, like for example --

ABDELAZIZ: Thank you so much Valeria. I'm so sorry. We've run out of time.

RACU: -- expropriating.

ABDELAZIZ: Valeria Racu, right in front of the parliament in Madrid, where a critical vote is taking place, but for those protestors that are camped out there, it is not enough even if these measures pass. We'll be right back. Please stay with us.

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ABDELAZIZ: Welcome back. Student protests over school conditions in France are escalating. The Interior Ministry says thousands of students have been detained since demonstrations broke out last month. This is including nearly 2,000 on Thursday alone. Saskya Vandoorne has more for us.

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SASKYA VANDOORNE, CNN PARIS BUREAU CHIEF: High school protests are intensifying here in France. I'm in Aubervilliers, just outside Paris, where students have been blockading their high school for over a week now, protesting conditions inside. Just moments ago, protesters were throwing -- setting bins on fire, throwing bottles at the riot police, and in response, the riot police tear gassed the protesters. The protests began last week and have since spread across the country,

and now university students are joining the movement. In Nantes, part of a high school was set on fire on Thursday, and in Lille, riot police used tear gas and charge students gathered behind barricades. The students say their classrooms are overcrowded, that they don't have enough teachers, and some say their schools are literally falling apart.

ALI BEN SAID, STUDENT (through translator): We're 30 in a class. We're overloaded. We cannot concentrate. And then the AC. When it's hot, there's no air conditioning, and when it's cold, there's no heating.

VANDOORNE: Some blockades have been peaceful, while others have descended into clashes with police. On Wednesday alone, over 600 people were detained, according to the Interior Ministry. Some blame heavy-handed policing for fueling the protests, while others point to members of France's far-left LFI party turning up at some of the demonstrations. LFI rejects that, saying its politicians are there to support the students' demands. French President Emmanuel Macron has condemned the violence.

EMMANUEL MACRON, FRENCH PRESIDENT (through translator): High schools are there to be open and to educate. They're not there to be blockaded or for bins to be burned.

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ABDELAZIZ: Now, France's Interior Ministry said security forces have intervened in cases of disorder, violence, or property damage, while stressing that most protesters are high school students and minors, which police do take into account. New instructions were also issued to law enforcement agencies to reinforce the government's policing approach.

Veterans and lawmakers are speaking out against U.S. President Donald Trump's plan to build the 250-foot arch in Washington. The groups gathered in Memorial Circle for a demonstration day on Thursday, they're calling on President Trump to end his plan for the Triumphal Arch. The president has said the structure would double as a top-grade military complex, housing snipers, drones, and large quantities of ammunition.

A federal judge will hear arguments next Thursday. This is on President Trump's White House media ban. CNN, MS NOW, and Politico want a two-week restraining order extended, maintaining their access to the White House right now. That access is limited. In fact, CNN was barred from traveling with the president on Air Force One, today. The media outlets say the ban is unconstitutional, but the White House claims reporting by the groups is a threat to national security.

Still to come this hour, new tattoo technology uses tiny needles thinner than a human hair ahead. How it could make getting inked pain- free.

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ABDELAZIZ: SpaceX made history with its latest mission to the International Space Station. The Crew Dragon space capsule launched Thursday from Cape Canaveral in Florida, carried a Russian cosmonaut and a Canadian astronaut and two U.S. astronauts, including Jessica Watkins, the first black woman to lead a space mission. The capsule also set a record for fastest time from launch to docking, reaching the ISS in just eight hours.

A company in London is offering a way to get a pain-free tattoo in mere minutes. CNN's Antoinette Radford reports on the new technology that features micro needles.

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ANTOINETTE RADFORD, CNN CREATOR: Would you get a tattoo if it was pain-free? I don't know about this tech, but it's this place in London that says it can give you a pain-free tattoo in 15 minutes, and I'm here to find out a little bit more about it. Ferdinand Kohle is a material scientist who loves tattoos but hates needles.

FERDINAND KOHLE, FOUNDER, CIPHERX: Let me show you our office.

RADFORD: So, this is the lab?

KOHLE: This the lab.

RADFORD: OK, cool. What am I looking at?

KOHLE: What you see here is one of our tattoo stations. That's where people can come and get a tattoo.

RADFORD: Why did you start doing this? Where did the idea come from?

KOHLE: I never got tattoos because I have a needle phobia. But somehow, with my then academic background later -- later on, like I had this idea, couldn't you use this really cool emerging technology called dissolving micro needles to deliver pigment into the skin, essentially tattoos.

RADFORD: But how does this style of Microdot tattooing actually work? Essentially, Ferdinand and his team have designed technology that enables you to choose a design and print that design onto a patch that sits on your skin, where minuscule micro needles, one-tenth of the size of a human hair, dissolve into your skin and administer the ink.

The patches come in these little silver packets and are administered by an applicator. And if you're wondering, yes, these are permanent tattoos. First, you decide where you want the tattoo.

KOHLE: And whereabouts would you like it?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Um, Anywhere here, I guess.

KOHLE: Perfect.

RADFORD: Then the patch is taken out of its packaging and put into the applicator.

KOHLE: Ready?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mm-hmm.

KOHLE: 3-2-1.

RADFORD: That really didn't hurt at all?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, not at all.

RADFORD: What did it feel like?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Um, nothing.

RADFORD: It sits like this for around 15 minutes, and then you have your new tattoo. But not everyone's convinced Ferdinand's pain-free technology is going to be the next big thing in the world of tattoos, including some tattoo artists. Sebastiano Concari has been tattooing in London for six years, and says people come to him for his artistry more than anything else.

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SEBASTIANO CONCARI, TATOO ARTIST: I'm not against like technology that could help tattooing because it's always been part of the tattooing industry.

RADFORD: Yeah.

CONCARI: Like I'm not scared of it, I would say because like I don't think this technology, this new like Microdot, is going to take out the experience of tattooing. I would say from -- yeah of a tattoo artist because it's like tattooing is not just, I put ink inside the skin of a person basically. The client wants to have like a piece from that artist, not just like a random pictures.

RADFORD: While the jury's out on whether this will be the next big thing for tattoos, the creators of the technology have other ambitions for where it might come in useful, like helping people with needle phobia in medical studies.

KOHLE: We already have prototype a number of cosmetic products that we are developing that we would like to get to market, for example, peptide delivery is one of those.

RADFORD: What do you see as -- as the future of this product you've developed?

KOHLE: Yes. So, this is really a technology platform that we're developing, and you could think about replacing the pigments that we're using right now with vaccines, for example, and that's exactly what we are doing. So, we are working with the University of Oxford on a vaccine delivery device.

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ABDELAZIZ: Thank you so much for watching. I'm Salma Abdelaziz. CNN Headline Express is coming up next, right after a quick break.

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