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CNN This Morning
U.S.-Ukraine Talks Set To Take Place In Geneva; Ukraine's Allies Working On Unified Response To Trump's Peace Plan; G20 Summit Adopts Declaration Despite U.S. Boycott, Opposition; JFK's Granddaughter Reveals Terminal Cancer Diagnosis; UAB Football Player Accused Of Stabbing Two Teammates Before Game; Cargo Ship Fire In Los Angeles Substantially Contained; Weather Could Impact Thanksgiving Travel Across The Country; FAA Expects Busiest Thanksgiving In 15 Years; Trump, Mamdani Have Friendly Oval Office Meeting; Increasing Number Of Americans Unhappy With The Economy; Potential Effort To Block States From Regulating AI; Michigan Officer Saves Choking Infant At Walmart; Therapy Dogs Providing Comfort For First Responders. Aired 6-7a ET
Aired November 23, 2025 - 06:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[06:00:42]
VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: Sunday, November 23rd, last week of November. Let's make it a good one. Welcome to CNN THIS MORNING. I'm Victor Blackwell. Here's what's happening today.
Top U.S. and European officials are meeting in Geneva. Next steps for ending the war in Ukraine. They are there to try to reach an end, to come to a deal. And it's happening as President Trump's peace plan is running into some major pushback.
Plus, we've seen the breakup. Could we soon be headed toward a makeup? What President Trump is now saying about Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Holiday travel rush, it's underway.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDREW WATTERSON, COO, SOUTHWEST AIRLINES: We have redundant technology. We have a better staffing, better decision-making. And so, we're able to handle these large-scale events very well.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: How Southwest Airlines is hoping to avoid another holiday travel meltdown. And President Trump and Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani struck a friendly tone, we can call it, during their White House meeting on Friday. This morning, what New Yorkers think about what they saw.
All right. Let's start with the officials. The top officials from the U.S., Ukraine, Europe, they're meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, today. And they're talking about how to end Russia's war on Ukraine. Now, the G20 in South Africa, Ukraine's allies are simultaneously working on a unified response to President Trump's 28-point peace plan. And it's been widely criticized as pro Russia.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FRIEDRICH MERZ, GERMAN CHANCELLOR (through translator): If Ukraine loses this war and possibly collapses, it will have an impact on European politics as a whole, on the entire European continent. And that is why we are so committed to this issue. Because if there's a chance to bring about peace, it will also have an impact on the entire European continent.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: And President Trump now insists that the 28-point plan is not his final offer. Now Secretary of State Marco Rubio, special envoy Steve Witkoff, they're expected to join today's talks in Switzerland. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will meet with President Trump before Thanksgiving.
And Zelenskyy has called this moment one of the most difficult in his country's history. We get more now from CNN's Kevin Liptak.
KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Good morning, Victor. An intensive stretch of diplomacy is now underway before President Trump's Thursday deadline for Ukraine to agree to this 28-point plan for ending the war. An American delegation composed of the special envoy Steve Witkoff, the American Secretary of State Marco Rubio, now in Switzerland, ahead of meetings with Ukrainian officials
who hope to put their imprint on this plan. And we understand that meetings with Russian officials will happen shortly thereafter.
President Trump said on Saturday that this plan was not his final offer. And I think that will be reassuring in some ways to those who view this 28-point proposal as essentially a Russian wish list. And many of the points do amount to the maximalist demands that the kremlin has been making over the course of this war, including that Ukraine give up the entire eastern Donbas region, that it put a cap on the size of its military, that it give up some of its long-range weapons capabilities, that it's been provided over the course of this war, and that it agreed to never join NATO.
And so, I think the real question now, and it's the question that I posed to President Trump on Saturday, is what happens if Zelenskyy does not agree to this plan by Thursday? Listen to what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Then he can continue -- then he can continue to fight his little heart out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LIPTAK: So, you hear the president there not saying specifically what the consequences might be for Zelenskyy not agreeing to this plan. But I think implicit in his answer is that this will then be Zelenskyy's war and that he will essentially wash his hands of it.
Now, European leaders have been extremely skeptical about this plan. On Saturday, they released a statement saying that it needed additional work and saying that they were in particular concerned about the provisions that would put limitations on Ukraine's armed forces.
Even some Republicans here in Washington are voicing concern, including one of the president's top allies in the Senate, the South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham, who said that parts of this proposal were, quote, "very problematic" and can be made better.
[06:05:06]
Perhaps blunter was Mitch McConnell, the former Republican leader in the Senate, by no means a fan of President Trump's. He said that, quote, "Putin has spent the entire year trying to play President Trump for a fool." Victor.
BLACKWELL: All right. Kevin Liptak, thank you very much. For more on today's talks and what's at stake, I want to bring in now, global affairs analyst Kimberly Dozier. Good to have you in studio. Let's first get your reaction to the president saying that this is not his final offer after making this a pretty hard deadline for Thanksgiving.
KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: You know, he said that on the way to a plane, and it gives him some maneuver room. But let's be clear, what's been put to Ukraine is Russia's wish list. And this seems to have been drafted by envoy Steve Witkoff, together with the Russian negotiator, and not with any Ukrainian input leaving Kyiv and European officials backpedaling, dismayed. It's as if six to eight months of work trying to convince Trump that he can't reward Putin for aggression has just evaporated.
BLACKWELL: Yes. And some of the requirements here would be that Crimea, Luhansk, Donetsk would now be recognized as Russian, even as by the United States, limiting the Ukrainian military to 600,000. They're currently estimated 800,000. A constitutional amendment that they would never seek NATO membership on and on. It's not clear that Putin would ever sign on to a deal.
DOZIER: True.
BLACKWELL: But if this is weakened in any way or one of those requirements is removed, Putin certainly is less likely to sign it then. Right?
DOZIER: You know, if Putin would sign a deal at all, this is the deal he would sign. But it has things in it that are poison pills that I can't see President Zelenskyy swallowing, like giving up any chance of prosecuting Russians for war crimes. And CNN and other outlets have extensively documented the horrific things that have happened that go against the laws of war, against Ukrainian civilians, things like massacres of Bucha, et cetera.
So, between that and leaving Ukraine essentially defenseless, what they're asking Ukraine to do is what it did when it gave up its nuclear weapons, and in return got a piece of paper that said Russia would never attack. And if it did, the west would drive Russia out and defend Ukraine.
Well, it didn't happen in 2022. European nations are still afraid to put their troops on Ukrainian soil for fear they trigger a nuclear conflagration with Russia. So, putting that kind of guarantee in this 28-point deal, again, is no guarantee of Ukraine's security.
BLACKWELL: Yes, it didn't happen in 2014 with the --
DOZIER: Yes.
BLACKWELL: -- annexation of Crimea then either. I think we have President Zelenskyy speaking for himself and reacting to this. Let's play that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PRESIDENT VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINE (through translator): The national Ukrainian interest must be taken into account. We're not making loud statements. We will calmly work with America and all partners. There will be a constructive search for solutions with our main partner.
I will present arguments. I will convince and offer alternatives. But we will definitely not give the enemy a reason to say that Ukraine does not want peace, that it is they disrupting the process, and that Ukraine is not ready for diplomacy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: What influence do you think the European allies of Ukraine have over the deal that will eventually be presented, or be the starting point for negotiations?
DOZIER: I think what you're going to have to see going forward is the British prime minister, the French president, the Finnish president getting on the phone with Trump and selling him on, this is bad, this is dangerous for us, and here's why.
And trying to explain to him the history of when Russia gets a piece of something like what it has done to the country of Georgia. Once it gets a foothold, then it uses that area to spread influence, buy politicians off, and eventually you get a situation like Belarus where the government is working in lock step with Moscow, has no choice.
That could be Ukraine's fate if this deal were allowed to go forward. And then that's also a signal to Russia, when you attack, you can win. And countries like Estonia, et cetera, in the Baltics that Putin has recently threatened to invade and take back they're saying, you know, we're next if you allow something like this to move forward.
BLACKWELL: Yes. And there is that deadline that's coming.
[06:10:00] The president was asked if the U.S. will withdraw military support. He said at that point, they can fight their little hearts out.
My question is, is this going to be a request to sign a deal or request to sign a document as a starting point for negotiations? Because that's important, what they're asking him to sign.
DOZIER: I think what you have in this meeting happening in Geneva, you've got skilled negotiators like Marco Rubio who know Ukraine could sign something that says this is a starting point, so you can get everyone in the room. They can't sign the deal as is because it's tantamount to giving up.
Zelenskyy would lose his office in the next election and Ukraine wouldn't be long for this world as an independent entity if they signed up to all of these various things, that would leave them hobbled and also hobble Europe's ability to protect Ukraine and future.
BLACKWELL: Just a few days out from the deadline, we'll see what comes out of Geneva. Kimberly, thank you.
DOZIER: Thanks.
BLACKWELL: All right. New this morning, global leaders wrap up their talks at the G20 summit in South Africa today. Yesterday, leaders from the participating nations adopted a declaration addressing the climate crisis and global challenges.
A U.S. official called the adoption of the declaration without U.S. input shameful. And the U.S. chose not to send anyone to the summit and boycott it over false claims that the host country persecutes its white minority.
Were joined now by CNN's Larry Madowo in Johannesburg, South Africa. Larry, get us up to speed.
LARRY MADOWO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Victor, we're just coming up to the close of the G20 Leaders' Summit here, the first that was held on the African soil. The leaders are gathering behind me and just over here in the media center we're supposed to hear shortly from Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish leader. But that declaration that they passed yesterday has gotten withering criticism from the White House.
The White House accusing South Africa of weaponizing its G20 presidency that has not followed the proper procedure in passing that declaration. President Ramaphosa said it was overwhelmingly passed by all the leaders here. Except Argentina said, they didn't agree to it. Argentina, obviously big allies of President Trump. And the White House, also saying that when the U.S. takes over the G20 presidency, it will -- President Trump will bring back the legitimacy of the G20 here.
But South Africa is not taking that lying down. The U.S. sent the charge d'affaires from the embassy in Pretoria to take over. That's the gavel, the ceremonial gavel that's supposed to be handed over. South Africa said they will not hand over to a junior official.
So, what they will do is they will have a small ceremony at the South African foreign ministry an official of equal standing to the deputy ambassador to take over the gavel. And that's the last way that South Africa has kind of asserted itself in this back and forth between the U.S. and South Africa in this argument over the fake claims of the persecution of the white minority here in South Africa.
And so, these leaders are back here from around the world. President Macron, Keir Starmer, European leaders from every corner of the world, Japan, and Canada, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia. They've all been here over the past two days tackling the global challenges and criticizing the transactional way that President Trump does business. They defended multilateralism and saying with the challenges facing the world, they have to talk, not separately, but together. And what you see there is the final event of the south African presidency.
After this, the U.S. takes over, and I think a lot of the language you saw in that declaration that the U.S. doesn't like will not survive over the past year as it is remade in the image of President Trump and the issues that he cares about, Victor.
BLACKWELL: Yes, the U.S. and the president looming large even in his absence. Larry Madowo for us in Johannesburg, thank you.
President Trump said that he is open to reconciliation with Marjorie Taylor Greene Saturday. Now, this is after the congresswoman announced that she will be resigning from Congress. While speaking to reporters outside the White House, the president said that he gets along with everybody and called Greene a nice person.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I just disagreed with her philosophy. I said, go your own way. And once I left her, she resigned because she wouldn't have -- she would never have survived a primary. But I think she's a nice person now.
BLACKWELL: What's next for Marjorie Taylor Greene? That is unclear. President Trump said in a phone interview with NBC news that he would love to see her return to politics one day, and the president has also seemingly changed his mind on sending National Guard troops to New York after his meeting with incoming mayor Zohran Mamdani.
We'll hear what the president had to say and get reaction from New Yorkers. That's coming up at 6:30. But right now, topping this morning's headlines, president John f. Kennedys granddaughter revealed a devastating cancer diagnosis Saturday. Doctors discovered 35-year- old Tatiana Schlossberg had acute myeloid leukemia shortly after she gave birth to her daughter in May of last year.
[06:15:00]
Recently, her doctors told her that she has less than a year to live. In her diagnosis, doctors told her that she has a rare mutation of the cancer that is only found in less than two percent of cases. Schlossberg is an environmental journalist and the mother of three- year-old son and a one-year-old daughter.
A University of Alabama Birmingham football player has been arrested after stabbing two teammates before the game on Saturday, according to police. The two wounded players are in stable condition. Police arrested Daniel Mincey, an offensive lineman who transferred to UAB in May for attempted murder and aggravated assault.
UAB officials would not confirm if Mincey was involved, but he appears to be the only UAB player arrested yesterday. And despite the incident, the team voted to play their game against South Florida to honor graduating seniors.
Port operations in Los Angeles have resumed this morning after an electrical fire caught on a cargo ship late Friday. The fire led to a massive response from the L.A. fire department. Nearly 200 firefighters battled those flames.
Officials say, the fire has now been substantially contained, and the cargo ship has since been moved. Now, the shelter in place order has been lifted and the port is back open and salvage teams are on the scene. Good news is no injuries were reported among the crew or the firefighters involved.
Coming up a little later, police -- a police officer jumps into action. He saved a choking infant inside a Walmart. We've got the video. Take a look at the dramatic rescue that's been caught by officers' body cameras.
Also, Southwest Airlines is bracing for the holiday travel rush. We all are. We'll take you inside the nerve center, where every flight is monitored in real time, and decisions are made to keep planes in the air.
CHRIS WARREN, METEOROLOGIST: Victor, weather mostly cooperating for holiday travel, with some exceptions. All of that forecast coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:21:48]
BLACKWELL: If you are one of the more than 80 million Americans expected to travel this week for the Thanksgiving holiday, be patient. You might need to take it slow. Make sure you got the new wipers on the windshield, because some folks are getting rain. Meteorologist Chris Warren is here with the full holiday forecast. This is important.
WARREN: Yes.
BLACKWELL: So, who's under it?
WARREN: Well, it's going to kind of come and go. There's nothing blockbuster that's on the way --
BLACKWELL: OK. WARREN: -- as far as this week's travel. There will be some spots. I'm going to show you those spots. Starting off with what's happening today.
And on the road there, rain and snow across parts of the southwest. Eventually a flood threat developing later this evening and tonight for parts of Texas.
This is where the rain and thunderstorms are right now, Arizona, New Mexico. Higher elevations, snow and even some thunder snow a possibility here with the action we're seeing right now.
Quiet to start here across Texas. That's going to change. Increasing rain and storms tonight could lead to that flood threat.
But as far as the holiday travel goes you can see that system in the southwest is going to move across the U.S. Another one moving across the northern tier is the one that we're going to watch for midweek.
So, that big Wednesday travel day is going to be interesting with that area of low pressure. The next couple of days, relatively warm even in Minneapolis, are going to see temperatures into the lower 50s.
Now for Wednesday, I'm thinking with this area of low pressure, not just the rain and the snow, but there's going to be wind with that, and that can cause some problems at the airports from Chicago to the Twin Cities there in Minneapolis.
And then a big cooldown here for Thanksgiving, you are going to feel it. Temperatures going to stay below the freezing mark in Minneapolis, Atlanta, and Orlando. Fifties in Atlanta, Victor, and 70 for Orlando. So, cooler air on the way. It's going to feel like winter.
BLACKWELL: That's not bad though for --
WARREN: No.
BLACKWELL: -- leading up to Thanksgiving travel.
WARREN: It could be worse.
BLACKWELL: It certainly could be worse. Are you traveling?
WARREN: Yes.
BLACKWELL: You're going to be traveling?
WARREN: On the travel, no, no, sir.
BLACKWELL: OK. Yes. Neither am I. Staying right at home. Thank you, Chris.
All right. So, the FAA predicts that this will be the busiest Thanksgiving travel period, although Chris and I are going to be sitting here, in 15 years. Tuesday is expected to be the peak for the flights. So, the question is, who's going to be watching all of the jets and making sure that they get there on time and safely? CNN's Pete Muntean met some of the folks at Southwest and went to their big control hub.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, good morning Southwest.
PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT (voice over): This is mission control for your Thanksgiving trip from storms --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Some scattered showers with isolated thunderstorms.
MUNTEAN: -- to software snags.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We'll keep you updated if that status changes.
MUNTEAN (voice over): Three hundred workers here inside Southwest Airlines Network Operations Control in Dallas are diving headfirst into the biggest travel rush of the year. Justin Lebon is helming what's called the bridge, and reporting to him are about a dozen different divisions on the floor, all monitoring everything from crew schedules to space launches to keep 800 airplanes moving.
JUSTIN LEBON, NETWORK OPERATIONS CONTROL DIRECTOR, SOUTHWEST AIRLINES: We move about 500,000 to 600,000 people a day. And you never know what's going to walk through that door with a problem.
MUNTEAN (voice over): Thanksgiving is this team's latest challenge after the government shutdown forced Southwest to cancel hundreds of flights a day.
WATTERSON: That's about what you'd see from a very bad winter storm.
MUNTEAN (voice over): Andrew Watterson is Southwest's chief operating officer.
WATTERSON: So, it wasn't that bad. Not easy, but it did not stress the network at all.
[06:25:00]
MUNTEAN (voice over): Southwest says, even still, 83 percent of its flights arrived on time, a testament to improvements it made after its massive schedule meltdown of 2022.
WATTERSON: We have redundant technology. We have better staffing, better decision-making. And so, we're able to handle these large-scale events very well.
MUNTEAN: These numbers are the flights that Southwest is monitoring in real time. There are about 500 flights in the air right now, but the day is still pretty young, and the airline still has about 2,500 flights left to complete for the entire day. On the biggest days of the Thanksgiving rush, that's like moving the population of Minneapolis.
STEVE WEST, V.P. NETWORK OPERATIONS CONTROL, SOUTHWEST AIRLINES: That's our goal is to complete the schedule.
MUNTEAN (voice over): Steve West heads the command center and showed me the scope of the work that goes on here. On this day, teams are monitoring bad weather coming for Las Vegas and Phoenix, both major bases for the airline. The goal here is to maintain what's called A- 30, that's getting flights to their destinations no more than 30 minutes late.
(on camera): Is this stressful? It seems kind of stressful.
WEST: It can be. But you know, these guys have been doing it for so long that it becomes natural for them.
MUNTEAN (voice over): For Justin Lebon, he says just 10 people not making their connections becomes personal. It's why he's confident Thanksgiving for the airline will be something to be thankful for.
LEBON: It's looking pretty good. I think the weather next week is looking pretty good. We always kind of stay, you know, about a week ahead, looking at general trends and everything, pretty good spirits and everything. So, we're looking forward to it.
MUNTEAN (voice over): Pete Muntean, CNN, Dallas.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLACKWELL: President Trump says the numbers for the economy are great, but there are a lot of Americans who say they're just not feeling it. They explain why they're struggling. Next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:30:56]
VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump has apparently changed his mind on sending National Guard troops to New York.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES: If they need it right now, other places need it more. But if they knew we had a very good meeting yesterday, we talked about that. But if they need it, I would do it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: Now, the reversal of his previous threats to send troops to the city came after his meeting with incoming Mayor Zohran Mamdani. The two New Yorkers appeared to hit it off in their first face to face meeting on Friday.
CNN's Gloria Pazmino is in New York with how locals are reacting.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) GLORIA PAZMINO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. We wanted to speak with New Yorkers about that Oval Office meeting on Friday to try and get their reaction and see what they thought about the meeting between Trump, who is from New York City and grew up in Queens, and Mayor- elect Zohran Mamdani, who represented Queens and is also from New York City. Two New Yorkers sort of going head-to-head and coming out with, I think, what a lot of people expected to not be such a friendly and warm reception.
We saw Trump essentially say that he wants Zohran Mamdani to succeed and that he wants to help the city of New York not help it. That, of course, goes against much of the President's rhetoric in the lead up to this election. We had heard him call Mamdani a quote-unquote, lunatic. He called him a communist, even though he's a Democratic socialist.
So, it wasn't clear how the President was going to receive him in the White House on Friday.
We asked New Yorkers what they made of the moment. This is what they told us.
So, you saw the clip. What was your reaction?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I really don't like the guy, but I'm glad that he was able to go in there and do a good job with the President.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm hoping that Mamdani does what he has to do -- to do what's right for the city.
PAZMINO: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's a lot of theater.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that Trump continues to be the most transactional president we've ever had. And if people are smart, then they find a way to give him something which may be meaningless, but it's important to him. And then he loves you and rolls out the red carpet.
PAZMINO: Are you guys supportive of Mamdani at this stage? Do you want to --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'll wait and see.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, wait --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'd like to give him a chance.
PAZMINO: Now, on Friday, President Trump was asked about the possibility that he might deploy the National Guard into New York City. We have seen as this administration has deployed federal forces into other blue cities around the country.
And he said that he would only do it if the city decides that it needs it. And that alone is already being seen as a victory by Mamdani's supporters and his allies. They're looking at those comments by the President essentially as a deliverable after this meeting that he had with him on Friday, the fact that he will not be sending the National Guard unless the city of New York tells him that it is needed.
So, we'll see what happens with this relationship over the next several months. Remember, Mamdani doesn't officially take office until January 1st. And a lot could change in the political landscape between now and then.
Gloria Pazmino, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLACKWELL: Despite an increasing number of people saying that they are unhappy with the economy, President Trump says it's fine.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Yes, the economy, as you saw, some incredible numbers came in. Investment in our country is bigger than ever before by a factor of two or three. And that means a lot of things are being built and a lot of plans will be opening very soon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: The September jobs report was better than expected, but some people say they are not feeling it. They're not seeing it. The White House says it's going to take time.
CNN's Ivan Rodriguez has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NAJEE KINARD, SNAP BENEFIT RECIPIENT: High price rise of everything going on with inflation. The tariffs, our dollars are not stretching as much as they need to.
IVAN RODRIGUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From food to health insurance.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's going to be triple.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Triple this year.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Which equates to double the cost of what we pay for our mortgage, for our house.
[06:35:01]
RODRIGUEZ: People are struggling to keep up with rising costs. A poll published by Fox News this week found 76 percent of Americans have a negative view of this economy up from 67 percent in July.
Vice President JD Vance says the administration needs time.
JD VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES: As much progress as we've made, it's going to take a little bit of time for every American to feel that economic boom, which we really do believe is coming.
RODRIGUEZ (voice-over): When it comes to American's paychecks in September, inflation adjusted hourly earnings were flat for the second month in a row, holding the annual rate of gain at 0.8 percent, the lowest in more than a year, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released Friday. For blue collar and service industry workers, real pay gains were even weaker.
The White House, however, continues to express optimism about the economy.
KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Wages are up by 3.8 percent over the year for American workers because of President Trump's pro-growth policies. In fact, real wages are on pace to increase roughly $1,200 for the average worker this year under President Trump.
RODRIGUEZ (voice-over): In September, inflation also rose to 3 percent for the first time since January, according to the Consumer Price Index.
I'm Ivan Rodriguez, reporting.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLACKWELL: AI safety rules. They are under fire. President Trump's order could reshape how states can and cannot regulate the technology driving our future.
We'll hear from an expert about what's at stake.
And tonight, on the whole story with Anderson Cooper, David Culver takes a look at exorcisms and the role they play across Christian faiths. It airs tonight at 8:00 p.m. Eastern right here on CNN. And you can watch it tomorrow on the CNN app.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:41:22]
BLACKWELL: President Donald Trump's potential AI deregulation push is raising some concerns among tech safety advocates and state lawmakers. There's an executive order draft that could block states from enforcing artificial intelligence regulations, so they couldn't make their own state laws.
According to a copy viewed by CNN, it directs Attorney General Pam Bondi to establish what's called an AI Litigation Task Force and that task force would challenge state AI laws and preempt them with Trump's more relaxed federal policies. A White House official says that until officially announced discussion about potential orders, it's just speculation.
Now experts worry though that as artificial intelligence becomes a larger part of our lives, AI companies need to be held accountable if their tools harm users. With me now to discuss Mackenzie Arnold, Director of U.S. Policy at the Institute for Law and AI.
Mackenzie, good morning to you. This is one of those issues that's not neatly along partisan lines. So, you've got the administration that could sign this this executive order, the President signing it. But you've got Florida Governor Ron DeSantis calling it federal overreach, you've got Senator Elizabeth Warren who agrees with him, Steve Bannon on that same side.
What would be the basis by which the federal government could challenge these state laws on AI?
MACKENZIE ARNOLD, DIRECTOR OF U.S. POLICY, INSTITUTE FOR LAW AND AI: That's exactly the right question and I think on the level that we're seeing in the EO, the answer is that they don't have the authority to do this. They're trying to solve a problem that really is within the power of Congress. Now Congress, if they want to preempt the states from legislating here that was in their powers and they've done that in several occasions in the past.
But what the EO is doing is asking essentially the agency is to pull out all the stops that they have in their existing powers, to instruct the states not to legislate here. The trouble is that the FCC, the FTC and others don't actually have that authority right now. And so, if they try, they're going to run into a wall.
BLACKWELL: The administration and really the lobbyists and the AI companies CEOs say that if you have this patchwork, it's going to be impossible to navigate, it's going to tamp down innovation, but we just had from the Supreme Court, the ruling on States requiring age verification for adult websites. That's a patchwork across the country, companies are figuring that out as well.
If those state laws are to protect the users, to protect them from deep fakes and the rest, do the states have the upper hand in these I guess lawsuits that could be filed?
ARNOLD: So, I think the law on this point is clear if you put a bunch of Constitutional law professors in the same room and ask them if the states are violating the Commerce Clause here, they'd say absolutely not. States have the authority to regulate within their borders and that's exactly what they're doing.
I think also on this innovation point if you ask the AI companies outside of this political context, what the biggest barriers to them commercializing their products are, this issue around a patchwork would be maybe item 20 on their list. The laws that we're seeing so far don't actually conflict in ways that are going to increase their compliance burdens. And like you said there are plenty of regulations in other arenas that may actually impede them.
If we want to focus on innovation, that's the place to target, not preempting these nascent AI laws.
BLACKWELL: All right, bring it home for me because we've talked about the corporations, we talked about the lobbyists and the politicians. For the person who's watching, why does this matter?
ARNOLD: One thing I think the administration does get right is that AI is going to be a generation defining technology. Now we can't predict the exact trajectory of it right now, but we are seeing incredibly capable, and that's something both our country and other ones recognize.
[06:45:13]
Now, the question isn't so much about getting regulations out of the way, but rather, how do we responsibly balance regulation with innovation? And I think if we let the states and Congress figure that out, just like they have historically in every other context, they're going to iterate on it and they will eventually figure it out.
BLACKWELL: All right, Mackenzie Arnold, thanks so much for helping us understand it.
So, when tragedy strikes, who heals the heroes? Meet this CNN Hero nominee whose therapy dogs bring hope and comfort to first responders when they need it most.
Her really inspiring story, that's coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:50:10]
BLACKWELL: You got to see this video, a police officer in Michigan saved a choking baby. This happened inside a Walmart and it was caught on the officer's body camera. Evan Sery from our Detroit affiliate WXYZ spoke with the officer and the baby's mother.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
EDWAR TALIA, STERLING HEIGHTS POLICE: David 90 we have a -- we have a child choking report to customer service. So, I rushed in there.
EVAN SERY, WXYZ REPORTER (voice-over): 8:30 p.m. November 1st sterling heights police officer Edwar Talia sprints to a scene straight from a nightmare.
BAYLEY SIMON, CHOKING CHILD'S MOTHER: I was nursing him and he went blue and limp.
SERY (voice-over): Mom, Bayley Simon says that's when five-month-old Jameson started choking.
SERY: What exactly did limp look like?
SIMON: He was like a wet noodle. There was nothing there. No movement. Nothing.
TALIA: Hold the baby, hold the baby.
SERY (voice-over): At that moment Officer Talia who just a week prior was recertified in CPR training.
TALIA: And me being there at that right moment was -- was insane.
SERY (voice-over): Started applying those life-saving measures.
TALIA: I'm not going too hard just -- just enough that I could like I could -- I could feel I could feel it on my other side of my hand, because obviously, I don't want to -- I don't want to hit him too hard.
Come on, it's OK.
SERY (voice-over): After several back blows, Jameson's airway was clear.
TALIA: And then he took a deep breath. As soon as he took a deep breath, he started like having the hiccups and I know once the baby gets, you know, hiccups, they need -- they need to burp, you know. So, I grabbed the baby -- I grabbed baby Jameson, put him over my shoulder started patting his back and then he actually fell asleep on me.
SERY (voice-over): An adorable end to a horrific start, mom grateful for the bystanders who were there to comfort her and Officer Talia who was there to give her boy another day.
SIMON: I'm not necessarily sure I would still have my son.
TALIA: We - we pride ourselves on -- on you know, serving and protecting but that day especially that was -- that was I mean full-on protection mode.
SERY (voice-over): In Sterling Heights.
TALIA: I just wanted to make sure that baby Jameson went home alive.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLACKWELL: Good work Officer Talia.
Our police in Monroe Township, New Jersey, they discovered the hard way that you cannot outrun a horse.
Look at this, an officer chased a horse that had been found loitering in a neighborhood on Friday. Is it loitering if it's a horse? I don't know.
Police say after a brief chase with an emphasis there on they called it a foot pursuit, the horse was finally caught and returned to its owner. Authorities are calling him Seabiscuit to protect his identity. OK guys, OK. The humorous social media post has now gone viral.
There's now voting that's happening for the 2025 CNN Hero of the Year. Here's one of your choices, someone who knows that first responders serve others in crisis. They often find it hard to get the help that they need. Heidi Carman and her golden retriever Kerith became a therapy dog in 2019, and she soon realized that emergency workers could benefit from their work.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HEIDI CARMAN, HANDLER: To fight the fires in California is like a war zone. It's grueling work. It's smoky. It's hot.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got (INAUDIBLE), guys?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
CARMAN: It's dangerous. They go for a minimum of two weeks, 24 hours on, 24 hours off.
That stress to have it lightened with a therapy dog visit is priceless.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Puppy, puppy, puppy, puppy.
CARMAN: We got Kerith in 2018, and we were training her to become a working guide dog.
OK, fetch (INAUDIBLE).
She was just too friendly to every single person. So, I started doing therapy dog work with her.
During the 2020 fire season, going around to fire base camps, she was so good at just making the firefighters feel better.
I started posting pictures on her Instagram. Then I was getting messages, can you come to my husband's police department? I'm like, yes, sure.
Now we have hundreds of therapy dog teams across the entire country. We go to fire base camps, fire stations, police departments, 911 dispatch centers. All first responders would benefit.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The average adult male lives around 18 years longer than the average adult police officer, and that is often because of chronic stress. And oftentimes as a defense mechanism, we close up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is she just for first responders?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She's so soft.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When we are around emotional support animals, you just see that all sort of melt away.
CARMAN: Cortisol levels go down. The endorphin levels go up. I can feel that goodness just coming up a leash.
[06:55:04]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just to have a dog come by and she can't talk, can't ask questions, it can kind of break the ice.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, I missed you too.
The first time I met Kerith, I had undiagnosed PTSD. She just picked up on it right away. She just went nose to nose with me, and we just had a moment, and it broke me down.
This was my wake-up call that I needed to go to therapy. The man's best friend for a reason.
CARMAN: We have helped so many people. I'm grateful to Kerith for showing me the way.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLACKWELL: It's a lot of love. You can go to CNN.COM/HEROES to vote for Heidi for CNN Hero of the Year.
We'll be right back.
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