Return to Transcripts main page
CNN This Morning
Ukrainian Forces Rescue Injured Comrade and Injured Enemy; Trudeau Announces Separation; Jury Sentences Tree of Life Synagogue Shooter; Fred Upton is Interviewed about Trump's Indictment. Aired 6:30-7a ET
Aired August 03, 2023 - 06:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[06:30:00]
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: To extraordinary stories of different fates on the front line
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WALSH (voice over): It is usually only the dead lying here in the craters of Ukraine's southern front. But sometimes a glint of life shines. This drone spotting a Ukrainian soldier, Serhly, separated from his unit. Wounded in the chest and leg by shelling, he filmed this as he lay alone, bleeding. He feared whatever fight to live he put up would not be enough, he later told CNN from his hospital bed.
SERHLY, UKRAINIAN SOLDIER (through translator): I was ready to fight for my life. And I did, even lying there under the blazing sun. I realized I was too close to the Russians. And you even start to look at your gun in a different way.
WALSH: But the drone operators had other plans. They attached water, medicine and a note to the drone and sent it back. It found him again and dropped the package. But he didn't know if it was friendly or a Russian bomb.
SERHLY (through translator): All the time I was crawling, a drone was always hovering above. We didn't realize if it was friend or foe. It was a lottery.
WALSH: This is the moment he realizes the drone may save him. The water and medicine kept coming, easing the pain that was visible, even from up high, and then he crawled back to safety.
SERHLY (through translator): The combat medics who gave me first aid when they found me were very surprised I survived for two days with a pierced lung.
WALSH: Serhly's recovering and talks now of a new life with greater value and purpose. They don't want to leave anyone behind said the drone operator.
EUGENE, DRONE PILOT, 15TH NATIONAL GUARD BRIGADE (through translator): Every life is important to us. I could not live with myself if we just left someone behind in the field. WALSH: Probably only several miles away, salvation was uglier. Here,
as Ukrainian assaults by the 15th National Guard on a Russian position. It is ferocious and eventually forced the dozen Russian troops to pull back. Artillery had injured the Russian commander badly, and the Russians left him behind, presuming he was dead.
But this video, supplied by Ukrainian forces, shows they found him alive. And he received medical treatment. We're not naming him for his safety, but he was later awarded a posthumous medal according to Russian media reports. Left behind and declared dead by his comrades. The Ukrainians who found him say he may have wished he didn't survive.
We said, don't try anything or you'll die, he says. And he asked us to shoot him. And we offered him a chance to do it himself, but he said he could not do that.
He's an enemy, and I had no real desire to save him, but order are orders and they have our guys and we can swap prisoners.
As a human, another says, I was shocked that they had left him behind. But as a soldier, I know my enemy and I know it's not an uncommon practice for them.
The opposite fates on different sides in these wide, ugly expanses of violence.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WALSH: Now, we should point out, we don't know if eventually Russia has become aware that this commander survived and is in Ukrainian captivity. But the speed of which they seem to have declared him dead and sort of drawn a line under that emblematic, I think, of what is fair to say, even objectively, Russia's value of human life on the front lines here. Ukraine trying there to, I think, broadcast the ingenuitial (ph) use to get its troops back alive.
But these losses now mounting on both sides as the grand of this push south becomes so much more strategically important for Ukraine and the wider west.
POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Nick, that is extraordinary to see. Thank you very much for bringing it to us.
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: Well, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his wife Sophie ending their marriage after 18 years. We're going to have reporting on that coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:38:20]
MATTINGLY: Well, after 18 years of marriage, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his wife are separating. The prime minister announcing the news on Instagram, writing, quote, "Sophie and I would like to share the fact that after many meaningful and difficult conversations, we have made the decision to separate." Erica Hill is with us now.
Erica, I think they've got three kids, right?
ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Yes.
MATTINGLY: I was in Ottawa with President Biden a couple of months ago.
HILL: Yes.
MATTINGLY: They were there. I don't think you'd ever see anything in public. Surprising. Very surprising.
HILL: There was definitely some surprise. I think - you know, I did a little deep dive in sort of Canadian media. Maybe some people who weren't surprised. But I don't think that there is as much of a focus sometimes as relationships in other countries as we see in the U.S. when it comes to politicians, which is interesting.
Eighteen years of marriage, as you noted. Their anniversary was just a couple of months ago. They were also together at King Charles' coronation back in May.
But putting out that statement, talking about these meaningful and difficult conversations they had.
And then in terms of the prime minister's office, they then put out, after this was posted on the Instagram accounts of both the prime minister and his, you know, now-separated wife, on their Instagram accounts. The prime minister's office putting out a statement noting that they had actually signed a legal separation agreement. Their focus, understandably, is their family, their children, asking for privacy for obvious reasons, saying they remain a close family.
And what was interesting, too, is, they noted that they'll actually be on vacation together next week, which -
MATTINGLY: And she has a book coming out as well.
HILL: She does. So she had announced that this spring.
MATTINGLY: Not that these are tied together, but because of the content of the book (INAUDIBLE).
HILL: No, but I think probably people will be more interested. So, she is a big mental health advocate. And has really been involved in that work. And announced in May that she has a book coming out next spring. It's called "Closer Together: Knowing Ourselves, Loving Each Other." And she had said in the announcement she would be sharing some of her own deeply personal stories that she had learned on her own mental health and wellbeing journey. So --
[06:40:05]
: Yes, well, thinking about the kids. Thinking about the family for sure.
HILL: Yes.
MATTINGLY: Erica, thank you.
HARLOW: Thank you.
MATTINGLY: Well, also this morning, the jury handing down a sentence of death to the gunman convicted of killing 11 people in the nation's deadliest anti-Semitic attack. We're going to hear from the victims coming up next.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDREA WEDNER, DAUGHTER OF TREE OF LIFE SHOOTING VICTIM: I needed to tell my story. We all needed to tell our stories. We needed to know -- everyone needed to know how brutal this was.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDREA WEDNER, DAUGHTER OF TREE OF LIFE SHOOTING VICTIM: I had a great sense of relief. And that there was justice.
I thought that the punishment was well served.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: That is the daughter of one of the victims of the Tree of Life Synagogue mass shooting reacting to the jury sentencing her mother's killer to death. Yesterday a jury in Pittsburgh handed down Robert Bowers' fate nearly five years after he carried out the deadliest anti-Semitic attack in the history of the United States. Bowers opened fire on the synagogue during services there. He killed 11 people, six more were hurt. This was in 2018.
Danny Freeman has been following the whole trial and has more from Pittsburgh.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANDREA WEDNER, SURVIVED SYNAGOGUE SHOOTING: I had a great sense of relief. That there was justice.
DANNY FREEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): In an exclusive interview with CNN, shooting survivor Andrea Wedner described the moment the sentence was announced.
WEDNER: It was a great sense of relief. It was very emotional. But here we are in the courtroom, and we're not allowed show our emotions. So, we waited until we got out into the hall and that's when we let it out. FREEMAN: Wedner said cried and hugged fellow family members who lost
loved one in the attacks. Wedner's own mother, 97-year-old Rose Mallinger, was killed during the shooting.
[06:45:01]
Andrea, who was also shot, stayed with her until her last breath.
FREEMAN (on camera): What was it like for you having to testify and relive so much of what happened that day?
WEDNER: It was difficult, but it was cleansing. It was freeing. I needed to tell my story. We all needed to tell our stories. We needed to know -- everyone needed to know how brutal this was.
FREEMAN (voice over): Verdict forms revealed jurors were not convinced of the defendant's court arguments, that the shooter suffered from schizophrenia or was motivated by delusions. And not a single juror believe Bowers, quote, "committed the offenses under mental or emotional disturbance."
Instead, the jury found Bowers methodically planned the shooting, was motivated by his hatred of Jews, and showed no remorse after the massacre.
Both judge and jurors were emotional alongside the families as the verdict was read.
AUDREY GLICKMAN, SURVIVED SYNAGOGUE SHOOTING: It felt like justice was happening.
FREEMAN: Audrey Glickman also survived the shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue and was immensely grateful federal prosecutors tried the case.
GLICKMAN: We did have the trial. We did learn all these facts from it that we would not have known without the trial. It would have just been, oh, he shot a lot of people, put him away for life, and that was it, and he would have been happy.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FREEMAN: Now, Poppy and Phil, in just a matter of hours we're actually expecting to see the formal sentencing process take place in the federal courthouse behind me. And as part of that we also expect to hear some more emotional victims' impact statements. And that will all be perhaps for the last time while the shooter is in the courtroom.
Poppy. Phil.
HARLOW: Thanks, Danny. Danny, I know you've been there covering this whole trial, and all of these jury deliberations. We really appreciate your reporting on it. Thank you.
MATTINGLY: Well, security has been ramping up in D.C. overnight ahead of Donald Trump's historic third arraignment. We're going to be live outside the courthouse.
HARLOW: Plus, who Donald Trump had dinner with last night and why they encouraged him to participate in the Republican debate.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:51:38]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL BARR, FORMER ATTORNEY GENERAL: But I have come to believe that he knew well that he had lost the election.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTINGLY: That was former Attorney General Bill Barr and his response last night when asked by our own Kaitlan Collins if he thought the former president really knew he lost the 2020 election despite peddling repeated election fraud claims.
Now, in just hours, Trump is set to be arraigned in federal court in Washington, D.C., after being indicted for his role in efforts to subvert the results of that election.
Joining us now is former Republican Congressman Fred Upton from Michigan. He's one of ten House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump after the January 6th insurrection.
Congressman, it's good to see you again.
To start with what Bill Barr said, do you think there's any way that the former president did not know that he lost the election?
FRED UPTON (R), FORMER MICHIGAN CONGRESSMAN: No, he must have known. I mean, I watched the interview last night with you all. Barr was very deliberate. But, you know, you read the indictment and there's person after person from his campaign to others that said, you lost, it's over, there's no evidence that's there. So, it's pretty clear that, reading the indictment, that, in fact, he did know, but he continued the big lie.
One of the things that it has become almost formulaic at this point after an arraignment, and there have been three, or after an indictment, where the president claims victimization. His supporters, of which there are almost unanimity inside the Republican conference, particularly in the House, to some degree in the Senate as well, claim victimization, claim weaponization.
I want you to liven to what Bill Barr said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL BAR, FORMER ATTORNEY GENERA: I don't think that, you know, this is an issue of his victimization. I think he brought this on himself. This is one of the reasons I oppose him for the Republican nomination because he has this pension (ph) for engaging in these reckless acts that create these calamitous situations and then undercut the cause he is supposed to be leading.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTINGLY: I -- the reason why that was striking is because so much of the last five or six years, and you know this having been a member of the House Republican conference, is Republicans scrambling to find any way to defend things that either they don't agree with, they wish it never happened, they wish hasn't been tweeted in 280 characters and yet they continue to do it without fail, including after this third indictment.
You were inside the conference. Why?
UPTON: Well, they don't like losing. They didn't like losing the White House. There's a real difference if you've got an administration, and I worked for the Reagan administration a long time ago, but there's a big difference between having an administration that's part of your party or one that's part of the opposition.
And so, you know, picking, for Republicans, picking on the Democratic administration is fair game I guess you could say. They don't like it. And, you know, the other thing is that Trump has such a stranglehold on the voters at the grassroots level. I mean I saw the polls that you ran a little bit earlier this morning, 70 percent believing Trump that the election was stolen yet there's scant evidence that it would have overturn any of those states, particularly here in Michigan, where it was 154,000 votes. You know, Trump had the speaker of the House, the speaker of the state senate in shortly after the election, prior to January 6th, saying, you know, can't you pass a resolution saying that the election was fraudulent? And they said, Mr. President, there's no such evidence that would overturn the election.
MATTINGLY: Right.
[06:55:03]
UPTON: Yet he continued to say, like he said in Michigan, like he said in Pennsylvania, more - more votes were cast than - than voters that were registered in those states. He said that about Detroit. He said that about Pennsylvania. And his supporters so much opposed to - to Biden just drank the lemonade.
MATTINGLY: But, you know, you talk about that they don't like to lose. Your party got wiped out in 2018. You lost the presidency in 2020. You massively underperformed in 2022. I think that's the disconnect I don't understand in terms of Republican lawmakers and public officials.
UPTON: Yes, well, they're - they're scared of primary. I mean you look here in Michigan. I mean we got wiped out. I mean our secretary of state, the A.G., the governor, the lieutenant governor, the Democrats won by, what, double digits here. For the first time in some 40 years, the house and the senate flipped. They lost virtually everything. We went -- we're now a minority in the delegation. It's seven Democrats, six Republicans. We were once 9-6 before. So, it's - you know, the moderate votes, those that are sort of like
-- I consider myself a Reagan Republican -- were really aghast at what happened. But, sadly, as you know, they have a - they have a grip on the party. And we see that here in Michigan where literally every member of the Michigan Republican delegation endorsed Trump a couple weeks go after the second indictment knowing full well that this third one's coming along.
But even this week, I mean, you saw a bunch of Republicans in Ohio that endorsed Trump.
MATTINGLY: Right.
UPTON: You see in Florida, DeSantis, where you'd think that he would have a control over his own congressional delegation. You know, all but two or three have endorsed trump.
MATTINGLY: Right.
UPTON: I mean Texas, all - all of those things. He's -- he's got a grip on the party that's not going to get loose. And I'll be anxious to see the polls when they come out next week in terms of what this latest indictment does as to his supporters knowing that, you know, a key member in 2016 Trump lost Iowa. I get all of Trump's e-mails. He's identified 100,000 Trump supporters that he wants to send to the caucuses early next week. He is -- he's up by, you know, what, 30, 40 points in some of these states.
MATTINGLY: Right.
UPTON: And he's taking all the air out of the room that the other guys can't - can't get even a breath.
MATTINGLY: Congressman, can I ask you, before I let you go, we -- I made this point earlier in the show. In terms House Republicans, how many of them actually believe Donald Trump won the 2020 election? Not what they say on TV. Not what they say to their supporters, what they say in the cloak room, what they say behind the scenes. How many of your 200 however plus members think that?
UPTON: I think in their heart they know that Trump lost. But what they will tell Manu and others in the press team is, you know, Trump - Trump won. He has every reason to lash out. He has every reason to think that he won. We shouldn't deny him that opportunity. It's free speech. And we know, you know, why aren't we going after Biden in the same way? I mean what they will tell you, I think, is different than what they really - what most of them feel in their heart in terms of what happened. And here we are, what, almost three years later.
MATTINGLY: Yes, it's amazing. I appreciate the shout-out to Manu, who doesn't get to chase you around in the hallways anymore, which I imagine to some degree is a relief.
Former Congressman Fred Upton of Michigan.
UPTON: He - he can still find me. MATTINGLY: Yes, I know he can.
I appreciate your time, sir. Thank you.
UPTON: He has to look a little lower.
HARLOW: To duck Manu is a skill.
MATTINGLY: That's a - and he was a talented lawmaker at that.
HARLOW: Yes, I bet.
MATTINGLY: It takes a special kind of talent.
HARLOW: It was good to hear from him, though, speaking truth about the facts.
CNN THIS MORNING continues now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The nation is bracing for the arrest and arraignment of a former president, again.
SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This entire area we expect to be flooded with law enforcement as they await for the former president's arrival.
ADAM KINZINGER (R), FORMER CONGRESSMAN: It is real life. It's so important for us to follow through, make sure justice is done.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you can get away with this, then what kind of democracy are you going to have.
BILL BARR, FORMER ATTORNEY GENERAL: He knew well that he had lost the election. The government has assumed the burden of proving that.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: They're also saying that he was just exercising his First Amendment right.
BARR: Free speech doesn't give you the right to engage in a fraudulent conspiracy.
COLLINS: You think Jack Smith has more?
BARR: Oh, yes, I would believe he has a lot more.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The special counsel alleges that Eastman was one of the architects behind Trump's attempts to overturn the election.
MIKE PENCE (R), FORMER U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: The president and his gaggle of crackpot lawyers asked me to literally reject votes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He'd give largely the same advice, I think, if the situation repeated itself today.
MICHAEL COHEN, FORMER LAWYER FOR Donald TRUMP: You don't even really need John Eastman to come out and tell the story.
[07:00:00]
Jack Smith already has the story.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: While military officials are claiming small advances in the southeast of the country, Russia continues its drone strikes.
