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Russia Fires Missiles at Odessa for Third Straight Night; Grand Jury Expected to Meet as Trump Faces Another Possible Indictment; Tornado Pummels Pfizer Plant in NC; New Details about U.S. Soldier Who Ran Into North Korea; Complaints Pour in about How Migrants are Treated. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired July 20, 2023 - 06:00   ET

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

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR/CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: That, combined with other films already out, could make it the highest grossing weekend of the year so far.

[06:00:12]

And Ryan Gosling, a blond Ryan Gosling, I've got to tell you, people are online debating which one to see first. There's a whole theory about which one you want to see first in that double header.

OK, thanks for joining me. I'm Christine Romans. CNN THIS MORNING starts right now.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR/CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, everyone. Let's go ahead and get started with "Five Things to Know" for this Thursday, July 20.

First, breaking overnight, intensifying attacks on Ukraine's Southern region targeting grain storage and the infrastructure for exporting food to people who desperately need it across the world. E.U.'s top diplomat calling the strikes barbaric. We're going to be live on the ground.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR/CORRESPONDENT: Big developments possible today in the federal investigation of efforts to overturn the 2020 election. The grand jury is expected to reconvene in just hours. And the former president has now 18 hours left to respond to special counsel's letter informing him that he has been the target.

Now, this morning also, severe weather in the U.S. A powerful tornado rips through North Carolina, leaving several people hurt and buildings severely damaged.

MATTINGLY: And just moments ago, I assume you were all up and watching the first game of the Women's World Cup came to an end, New Zealand beating Norway. The American team set to kick off tomorrow.

PHILLIP: And we have a winner. A single player in California takes the entire $1 billion Powerball Jackpot. He's having a great day.

And CNN THIS MORNING starts right now.

MATTINGLY: I think there's a lot of disappointed people. I'm not one of them.

PHILLIP: I am, though.

MATTINGLY: You know why? Because you said earlier this week, if you won, you wouldn't be hanging out with me for the week.

PHILLIP: It's not --

MATTINGLY: So I'm just happy.

PHILLIP: It's not personal. I just want to be on an island somewhere.

MATTINGLY: It's a little personal. I can -- I like that energy. I'm with that.

But we do have a lot of news this morning. And we want to start with what's new this morning.

We are seeing the damage from the worst night of shelling and artillery fire in Odessa, Ukraine, since Putin's invasion began. Russia launching an intense barrage of drone and missile attacks on the Southern port city for the third night in a row, damaging a building, destroying a nursery, killing one person and leaving at least two people injured.

Officials in Odessa urging people to stay in their shelters until the sirens end, to quote, "take care of yourself and your loved ones."

PHILLIP: The E.U.'s top diplomat is also warning now that this series of attacks on Odessa is causing large-scale destruction of food infrastructure. He says that not only did Russia withdraw from the Black Sea grain deal, they are now burning the grain, too, in attacks that he calls barbaric.

Russia launched 38 air attacks overnight in the Southern region of Ukraine, also hitting the port city of Mykolaiv, striking a three- story residential building. Officials say that at least 19 people were wounded, including several children.

CNN's Alex Marquardt is live with us in Odessa.

Alex, lots of destruction behind you. What are you seeing there?

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Enormous destruction, Abby and Philip. This city has never seen anything like this since the beginning of this war.

I can't overstate the terror that the citizens of this city have had to experience over not one but the last three nights. And it is no mistake that Odessa is home to Ukraine's most famous port.

I want to show you some of the destruction from last night. This is an administrative building. It looks like it was around four stories high. You can see it has completely collapsed. We are told this is still a search-and rescue-operation. We know that at least one young man was killed. There were several people who were injured. You can see those firefighters trying to put out the fires in this

building, both in -- from among the rubble and up on that ladder up there. There are firefighters. There are rescue workers. Now, there are volunteers and residents of this neighborhood who are just trying to make sense of what we experienced last night.

We are on the edge of the port, one of -- the biggest port in Ukraine, which we can't show you for security reasons. But that is almost certainly why, according to Ukrainian authorities, Russia has been carrying out these strikes on Ukraine.

Now, this attack started just before 2 a.m. local time. It was a combination of drones and missiles. We could hear those drones very clearly buzzing the rooftops in downtown Odessa.

I want to play you some of the video that -- sorry, we're just going to get out of the way of these -- this water. But Abby and Phillip, I want to play you some of the video shot by photojournalist Scott McQuinny (ph) of one of the explosions of the missiles here in Odessa last night. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(EXPLOSION)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[06:05:02]

MARQUARDT: That is the kind of thing that we heard for an hour and a half.

Now, it was not just Odessa that was hit. It was also Mykolaiv, which is another Southern port city. There, 19 people were wounded.

This was an incredibly sophisticated attack. Almost 40 drones and missiles. Most of the missiles got through. Russia used long-range strategic bombers, supersonic bombers. They used four different kinds of cruise missiles. They used those Iranian kamikaze drones. Just the symbolism of what they used is sending a very large message to Ukraine.

President Zelenskyy has said it is very clearly Russia trying to target the grain infrastructure just a few days after Russia pulled out of that critical grain deal -- guys.

MATTINGLY: Alex, you and the team, you mentioned Scotty McQuinny, your photojournalist, have been there every night the last three nights. Can you take people into what it's like on the ground in the midst of these strikes, particularly as they've accelerated?

MARQUARDT: Yes. It's almost like clockwork, Phil. It starts just before 2 a.m. The first warning are those air-raid sirens that our viewers have seen over the course of the past year and a half. That is the warning for residents of Odessa and elsewhere to stay inside, to get down into the basement. And then what we've seen, for three nights in a row, are these bright

yellow and red tracers from the air defenses being fired up into the sky. Those are trying to take down those Shahed drones. You can see those spotlights that are searching the sky, looking for the drones.

But then you start to hear the much bigger munitions -- the rockets, the interceptor rockets -- going up to try and knock down and destroy the incoming cruise missiles. Sometimes they're successful. You'll see these huge explosions in the sky. The glow just completely lighting up the black sky.

Sometimes, like here, the missiles will land. It is -- it can be, certainly, a terrifying experience. Last night we saw families running into the shelters. Again, this was the middle of the night, around 2 a.m.

And it's not brief. It lasts for a long time. At the end of these -- at the end of these nights, at the end of these attacks, there is an all-clear that is given by the Ukrainian authorities.

Thankfully, there are some very good detection, early detection warning systems put in place, so we do have some sense of what is coming. And people do have, to some extent, some time to get into shelters.

But obviously, it is not a perfect system, and obviously, Russia is using incredibly sophisticated weaponry to target Odessa and other cities -- Phil, Abby.

MATTINGLY: Nearly 600 days into the war, it's still completely jarring to see the destruction behind you. Alex Marquardt live in Odessa, Ukraine, thank you.

PHILLIP: In just hours from now, a federal grand jury is set to meet as Donald Trump faces another potential criminal indictment.

We're expecting the panel in D.C. to hear more testimony from witnesses in Special Counsel Jack Smith's investigation of the alleged scheme to overturn the 2020 election.

Now, the big question is when the jury's big decision on charges might come down. Midnight is the deadline for Trump's lawyers to respond to Smith and to decide if they want to put Trump in front of that stand.

But new overnight, we are also learning that Trump has now beefed up his defense team, and he's quietly hired another attorney. Sources tell CNN that the former president's lawyers are scrambling to find out if Smith has any more witnesses and evidence that they don't know about yet.

Let's bring in CNN's senior crime and justice reporter, Katelyn Polantz, on this. So Katelyn, this is a potentially big day. The grand jury is expected to meet. What can we expect today?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Abby, it's going to be a day where we're watching yet again the grand jury at the federal courthouse in D.C.

But their proceedings are secret, and it is really hard to predict exactly what moves the Justice Department is going to make in the coming days.

Clearly, they've signaled to Donald Trump to expect an indictment related to January 6th, related to his actions after the presidency, but you know, a lot of things can happen with the grand jury.

They will be looking at the indictment. They would have to vote on it in secret to approve it. That typically happens. It would be very unusual for them to decline to approve an indictment, especially after they've spent months and months and months hearing from witnesses, looking at evidence in a case like this.

But there's also the question of when is the Justice Department ready to ask them to approve that indictment? There is at least one witness going in today, a man who actually has been before the grand jury twice before, Will Russell, an aide to Donald Trump. We expect him to talk to the grand jury.

We expect maybe one other, maybe others to go into the grand jury, as well, and wrap up their testimony, maybe button up little parts of the story that the grand jury hasn't heard yet.

And then, of course, Trump does have the opportunity to testify, if he wants to, to the grand jury, which would be also highly unlikely in this situation. He didn't in Florida.

And so we're watching there. And he did add a lawyer to his team, John Lauro, somebody who is more experienced on the Florida, Mar-a-Lago side of the case, but is being brought in to help, as well.

[06:10:06]

PHILLIP: Yes. There's still a lot that they need to do in terms of building this legal team.

Katelyn Polantz, thank you.

MATTINGLY: Also new this morning, "The New York Times" reporting the specific laws that were in that letter informing former President Trump that he was the target of the federal January 6th investigation.

CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig is here. And Elie, I think it's the third statute that has people surprised, to some degree. We expected the first two, but the third, the one related to civil rights historically, goes back to post-Civil War era.

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Yes.

MATTINGLY: That being on the table right now. Tell people what that means.

HONIG: So let's break down what new we're learning about the potential charges here. The first one is a conspiracy to defraud or commit a crime against the

United States. A conspiracy, Phil, means two or more people, meeting of the minds to commit a crime. Does not necessarily mean somebody else will be charged along with Donald Trump, if he's charged. Charges could come later or not at all. But two or more people; that refers to the broad effort to steal the 2020 election.

Now, the one you're talking about that's interesting here is deprivation of rights. Let's look at what that means. Forget about all the legalese. The important part here is two or more people, again, getting together to interfere with any right or privilege that a person has under the Constitution of the United States.

As we sort of speculated yesterday -- now it looks like we were right -- this looks like it refers to the right of every person to cast a vote and to have that vote counted.

And then the third potential charge that we're learning about is witness tampering, but that asterisk is there on purpose. Because we have to be careful here. There is a very broad law called witness tampering, but the titles of law sometimes can be misleading.

One section does deal with your typical witness tampering: trying to influence or intimidate a witness. But there's a different subsection within that law that deals with obstruction of an official proceeding. So that could deal with attempts to try to derail Congress from counting the electoral votes, which is different from witness tampering.

MATTINGLY: It's good context. Because I think when you see that, you immediately think there's some kind of mob-related.

HONIG: Yes.

MATTINGLY: The Espionage Act isn't always about spying. Witness tampering isn't necessarily exactly what you think.

I do want to ask, in terms of there were several legal developments in the former president's world yesterday, including a ruling in the Manhattan district attorney's case involving hush-money payments to the adult film star, Stormy Daniels. What does that say?

HONIG: Yes. So we remember Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan D.A., has of course, indicted. We have a trial date in March. But he has indicted Donald Trump for those hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels.

Now, Donald Trump made a very interesting motion. He wanted to walk his case, basically about a half block from state court over to the federal court, where I used to work.

Now, why would you want to make that move if you were Donald Trump? Well, you could get -- you would get a different judge. You could have a more favorable jury pool, because in federal court, you're going to pull your jury from many different counties. In Manhattan court, it's only going to be Manhattan. Donald Trump is more popular politically in those other counties. MATTINGLY: Right.

HONIG: But most importantly, the way you get from state to federal court is you show that what you are charged with related to your official job responsibilities. And if you can make that showing, not only do you get to federal court, but you get the case dismissed, because you have immunity as a federal officer.

That was the argument Donald Trump made, has been squarely rejected now by the judge. The judge ruled that, quote, "Hush money paid to an adult film star is not related to a president's official acts." Doesn't seem like breaking news, not a surprising decision, but indeed, that motion has now been rejected by the federal court.

MATTINGLY: You guys studied that in law school, right?

HONIG: Yes. This took a long time to figure that one out.

MATTINGLY: Took a full year. There was also news or developments in the E. Jean Carroll case that the president -- former president has been dealing with.

HONIG: Yes, so we remember, the verdict -- This is a civil case. The jury found that Donald Trump was civilly liable for sexually assaulting, not raping -- they rejected the rape charge -- but for sexually assaulting and defaming E. Jean Carroll.

They awarded E. Jean Carroll $5 million in damage.

Donald Trump asked the judge, the same judge who presided over the trial, to throw out that verdict. The judge declined to do so. He said its verdict, the jury's verdict, is not a, quote, "miscarriage of justice," meaning their verdict was within the realm of reason, and I will hold it up.

MATTINGLY: Can I go back real quick --

HONIG: Yes.

MATTINGLY: -- to what's happening today?

HONIG: yes.

MATTINGLY: We know -- We expect the grand jury to meet. We obviously have seen the target letter. A lot of people are speculating about a lot of things. What should people be expecting if the grand jury meets today and what happens next?

HONIG: Yes, so real quick, difference between a trial jury and a grand jury is really important. A trial jury, of course, has 12 members --

MATTINGLY: Right.

HONIG: -- plus some alternates, but 12 that vote. A grand jury is bigger -- grand -- 23.

In a trial jury, you need all 12. In a grand jury, you only need a majority, 12 out of 23.

And the proof in front of a trial jury is what we call beyond a reasonable doubt. Of course, the highest standard in law. In a grand jury, it's lower; it's just probable cause.

That's why people say it's easy to get an indictment out of the grand jury, ham sandwich and all that.

What's left to happen? The final witnesses have to testify. Will Donald Trump be among them? He's been invited. I would not bet on it. But we do know that at least one former staffer will be testifying.

When your witnesses are done, you show the grand jury, as a prosecutor, your draft indictment, and then they take that vote. If they vote yes, then we have an indictment.

[06:15:03]

MATTINGLY: But they've been doing -- they've been having interviews in the Mar-a-Lago case after the indictment. Why?

HONIG: Yes, you can continue investigating even after you get an indictment. It does not close the door. We used to say you investigate until the moment the actual trial jury comes back with a verdict.

MATTINGLY: OK. Grand is bigger.

HONIG: Grand is big.

MATTINGLY: That was a 3L. That was 3L for Elie Honig. Thanks, man, appreciate it.

PHILLIP: All right. Also this morning, more extreme weather is still playing plaguing the country coast to coast, with tens of millions of Americans still facing heat advisories.

In Kentucky, the governor declared a state of emergency after potentially record rain flooded the state. This was the scene in Mayfield in Southwest Kentucky.

And in Rocky Mountain, North Carolina, a tornado packed 150 mile-per- hour-winds pummeling a Pfizer pharmaceutical plant. And the twister also tore the roof off of part of that building, as well, sending medicine and other debris flying everywhere.

So more than a dozen people there were injured. CNN's Dianne Gallagher is just next door in the down of Dortches. Dianne, what are you seeing there?

DIANNE GALLAGHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, Abby, here in Dortches, Nash County, North Carolina, this is where we're seeing the predominant amount of damage here from that EF-3 tornado.

Look, basically, it's things like this. We're talking about large pieces of people's homes, nails, shingles, as those 150-mile-per-hour winds ripped through Town Hall Road where we are right now. It's at least 16 people, we're told, who were injured. But if you take a look, and the stories of survival from that, thankfully, no one was killed. There were people inside this home when the storm came through here.

Look, according to the National Weather Service, this is the first EF- 3 tornado in the month of July ever to hit North Carolina. It went from here in Nash County through Edgecombe County, where there were also injuries, damage to businesses and homes.

According to the mayor, this just all happened so quickly.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR JACKIE B. VICK, DORTCHES, NORTH CAROLINA: I don't ever want to see another one like it again, because it went from sunshine to pitch- black. And I guess this storm here lasted probably less than a minute, and you see what it's done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GALLAGHER: Now, in Rocky Mountain, North Carolina, that Pfizer manufacturing plant, that's the largest employer in the county. It also provides more than 25 percent of all sterile injectables to hospitals across the country.

Pfizer says it is still assessing the damage. There were no serious injuries.

But the sheriff, Abby, of Nash County has said that he had reports of more than 50,000 pallets of medicine that were just thrown about there. There are transport trucks that have been damaged, as well, including rain and wind damage there.

It's something that here in the county, they're very focused on, because it is an employer but also what that ripple effect may be across the country.

PHILLIP: Yes. It's the impact on the supply of medication. It's a huge problem, potentially. Dianne Gallagher, thank you.

MATTINGLY: Well, coming up, troubling new reports detail the inhumane treatment of migrants at the U.S./Mexican border. We're going to take you live with what the Justice Department plans to do about it.

Plus --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SARAH LESLIE, WITNESS: I didn't think anyone who was sane would want to go to North Korea, so I assumed it was some kind of stunt to, you know, run to the North Korean border fence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: We're now hearing from a woman who watched a U.S. Soldier bolt into North Korea. Our Will Ripley is standing by, live near the DMZ with new details on this story this morning.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:22:12]

MATTINGLY: Well, there are still plenty of questions. But this morning, we have new details about how American soldier Travis King on, his way back to the U.S., actually ended up bolting into North Korea instead.

Officials in Seoul say Private King passed through airport security, but then said his passport was missing. He was taken back to the departure area, and then he left.

The next day during a tour of the Demilitarized Zone, he ran across the demarcation line and into North Korea.

CNN's Will Ripley is live near the Demilitarized Zone. And Will, U.S. officials are now investigating the why, but what can you tell us about what we've learned from people that were on the ground and actually watched this play out?

WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, there are a lot of questions that are kind of emerging, Phil, as we put together exactly how this happened.

And we go back to Monday when, as you mentioned, Travis King, this Army private who had just gotten out of almost 50 days in jail here for an assault charge. He was accused of, you know, getting into basically a fight with people.

He was on his way back to Texas. He was actually checked into an American Airlines flight bound for Dallas, where he was going to get kicked out of the Army.

He cleared customs at Incheon Airport, which is about an hour and 90 minutes' drive from where I'm standing here in Seoul. And then he reported a missing passport, didn't get on the plane, and somehow was able to make his way back to this area.

Now, we are standing about five kilometers or so from the actual joint security area where this incident took place on Tuesday.

He was able to get on this tour. He took the tour inside the Demilitarized Zone. His name cleared the passenger manifest, which the United Nations had to approve before they let any of those people in there. And then he was able to run across the demarcation line into North Korea.

He was driven away by North Korean guards. Haven't heard from him on Wednesday. Haven't heard from him today, Thursday. We don't know his whereabouts, and we really don't know what's going to happen with the North Koreans. Because right now, as you've been talking about, there's no official line of communication, nothing publicized by the North Koreans as of yet. He will be questioned. The question is when, for how long, and when --

will it be a matter of days, weeks, months or longer, before he's able to actually to go home.

MATTINGLY: And what was fascinating yesterday was we're starting to get some eyewitness accounts. We had been trying to figure out on this show for a couple of days, all right, where could he have done this, how could he have done this, given kind of structurally how that area is set up. But there was a woman who witnessed the crossing. What did she say?

RIPLEY: Yes, she took a picture of him. He was standing right there in the JSA, the Joint Security Area where, actually, former President Trump walked into North Korean soil when he was meeting with Kim Jong- Un.

She described this -- Sergeant Travis's crossing as being very quick, very confusing. She almost thought it was like a prank at first. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LESLIE: Someone ran close to me very fast, and I thought what is going on? He -- I didn't think anyone who was sane would want to go to North Korea, so I assumed it was some kind of stunt to, you know, run to the North Korean border fence and have someone film it or something like that.

[06:25:07]

A couple of seconds after I saw him, that's when the soldiers shouted and started running after him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RIPLEY: She thought it was a TikTok stunt. But when he jumped in the North Korean van and was whisked away, well, he's now in a place where there certainly is no TikTok, Phil, or any other social media. Which means he's basically in one of the most isolated countries on Earth.

He ran there willingly in a matter of seconds. When he gets out of there, well, that could take a very long time.

MATTINGLY: Yes. Still a very open question. Will Ripley there, reporting live near the Korean DMZ, thank you.

PHILLIP: A disturbing new report from the border is raising eyebrows over at the Justice Department. The report alleges that Texas troopers were told to push migrants back into the Rio Grande and ordered them not to give them water in those scorching temperatures.

Now, in a statement to CNN, the DOJ called the report troubling and said it's assessing the situation. It could be the first step toward an investigation. CNN's Rosa Flores reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) JESSE FUENTES, TEXAS RESIDENT: We're in the middle of the Rio Grande.

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Jesse Fuentes grew up riding the waters of the Rio Grande in Eagle Pass, Texas.

FUENTES: The river that I love.

FLORES (voice-over): And in 2015, he turned his passion into a business, launching Epi's (ph) Canoe and Kayak.

FLORES: What was business like?

FLORES (voice-over): It was beautiful.

FLORES (voice-over): Fuentes even organized races on the river, but not anymore.

GOV. GREG ABBOTT (R-TX): We're securing the border at the border.

FLORES (voice-over): Governor Greg Abbott has deployed concertina wire, shipping containers, and most recently, 1,000 feet of floating border barrier and netting on the river. The buoys are 4 feet in diameter and anchored to the bottom of the waterway.

ABBOTT: A strategy that no state has ever before deployed to stop people from entering Texas illegally.

FLORES: the state of Texas didn't exactly follow the law when it started installing the buoys on the Rio Grande. According to the U.S. State department, a series of treaties between the U.S. and Mexico governed the use of the water on the Rio Grande, and Texas not only didn't consult with the U.S. federal government before installing the buoys; it didn't obtain a permit.

FUENTES: It used to be a beautiful pristine island.

FLORES (voice-over): Fuentes points to an island on the river he says Texas also destroyed. Here's what the island looked like on Google Earth. Here's what it looks like now. The island is gone. The vegetation is dead. A road and concertina wire taking its place.

FUENTES: It made me want to cry. It was sad.

FLORES (voice-over): Fuentes filed a lawsuit, claiming the buoys will prevent him from making a living.

And Mexico's top diplomat complained to Washington, saying the buoys violate two treaties between the countries, including one that prohibits construction that deflects or obstructs the flow of the river.

Mexico is also concerned the buoys may be on their territory.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is our property.

FLORES (voice-over): Magali and Rou (ph) Urbina say they, too, have complained about Texas, but for installing concertina wire on their land and for refusing to remove it.

ROU URBINA (PH), TEXAS RESIDENT: Has DPS taken over control of private properties? Yes. Are we in support of it? No, we are not.

FLORES (voice-over): But the most alarming part of it all is what they say they witnessed: migrants needing help and Texas National Guard members just standing there.

MAGALI URBINA, TEXAS RESIDENT: I asked, aren't you all going to help? And they just sat there, and they said, We can't. We can't get onto your property. They told us not to get onto the property. They told us not even to give them water. And I said, Fine, and then I just turned around and we just kept helping people out.

FLORES (voice-over): Texas National Guard denies the allegations.

The Urbinas' account comes after Texas DPS released emails showing top brass acknowledging an increase in migrant injuries from concertina wire and a Texas state trooper blowing the whistle to superiors about a 19-year-old stuck on the wire while having a miscarriage; a 4-year- old passed out due to exhaustion; and about being ordered to push migrants into the river and deny them water, allegations the agency denies.

Maverick County Sheriff Tom Shmerba (ph) says he's never witnessed state trooper mistreat migrants, but he's worried the buoys could mean more migrant deaths.

SHERIFF TOM SHMERBA (Ph), MAVERICK COUNTY, TEXAS: I hope that I'm wrong, but I think we're going to have some people drowning in that area.

FUENTES: I want to be that voice for the river, because the river can't speak for itself.

FLORES: Are you afraid of going against the state of Texas?

FUENTES: Am I afraid? No. Is my business suffering? Yes. Is my heart suffering? Yes.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FLORES (on camera): Now the U.S. DOJ says that it's assessing the situation, that it's working with other agencies, but it's unclear if legal action will be taken.

As for Jesse Fuentes, he says that he's waiting for a judge to set his first court date.

And Abby, you can see the buoys behind me. Fuentes says that he plans to ask a judge to force the state of Texas to remove them -- Abby.

PHILLIP: Incredible reporting from you down there, Rosa Flores in Eagle Pass, Texas. Thank you.