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CNN Tonight

Washington Post Reports, Trump Employees Moved Boxes the Day Before FBI Agents Came to Mar-a-Lago for Documents; 11-Year-Old Mississippi Boy Who was Shot by Responding Police Officer After Calling 911 is Released from the Hospital; College Enrollment This Year has Dropped 1 Million Students since 2019; New Drugs Could Boost Weight Loss and Additional Benefits. Aired 10-11p ET

Aired May 25, 2023 - 22:00   ET

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


[22:00:00]

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN HOST: And the family attorney says Aderrien is traumatized and called for the officer involved in that shooting and the police chief to both be fired. You can go to cnn.com for more information about this story.

And thank you for joining us. CNN Tonight with Alisyn Camerota is starting right now. Alisyn, hi.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: Hi, Abby. Such a horrible story. We're going to be talking about the developments in that case as well.

PHILLIP: Very sad.

CAMEROTA: Yes, awful. That should never happy obviously. So, we'll try to figure out what went wrong. Great to see you, Abby.

Good evening, everyone. I'm Alisyn Camerota. Welcome to CNN Tonight.

Why was Donald Trump's staff moving boxes of documents around Mar-a- Lago when they knew that the FBI was coming the following day to look for classified documents? The Washington Post reports that investigators consider the timing here a potential sign of obstruction. So, what happens now? Our panel tells us what this means for this investigation.

Plus, that 11-year-old Mississippi boy called 911 for help during a domestic disturbance, but when police arrived, as you heard, they shot him. So, we'll give you new developments in this case.

And Mike Rowe is here to talk tonight about why college enrollment is at its lowest point in years.

But let's begin with the Washington Post reporting on two Trump employees allegedly moving boxes of papers at Mar-a-Lago just one day before FBI agents traveled there to pick up classified documents. And that's not all. The Post reports that investigators have evidence that the former president kept classified documents out in the open in his office and showed them to others. We're going to bring in my panel. We have Errol Louis, political anchor for Spectrum News, also Rachel Nichols of Headliners with Rachel Nichols on Showtime, Republican Strategist Jason Osborne, and CNN Political Commentator S.E. Cupp.

But here first to help us break this down this legally is our CNN Chief Legal Analyst Laura Coates. Laura, great to see you.

So, tell me what does all these new developments, what are the legal implications here for Donald Trump?

LAURA COATES, CNN CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: Wow, Alisyn, I mean, just think about it. One of the hardest things to do as a prosecutor is to figure out how I'm going to get inside the brain of a potential target. How do I figure out that person's intent? How do I figure out what they really wanted to do? And then you have this reporting that suggests that not just the documents were retained or that they were moved.

But the possibility of even a dress rehearsal to figure out what to do when the National Archives came to get the documents or a duly executed subpoena was actually issued and then fulfilled, it really does not bode well for an intended defendant or a target to have this type of information out there because it really confirms the possibility that you do have intent, the intentional act to try to obstruct a lawful investigation.

And, remember, this is all falling under the Presidential Records Act, Alisyn. As you well know, these documents don't belong to the former president, Donald Trump. He had advance notice that they did not. Even if it wasn't inadvertent retention of documents, he was certainly, for months, on notice that he was no longer supposed to have them.

So, reporting that suggests that there was a plan in place in addition to his own attorney having had to testify in front of a grand jury, Alisyn, and the attorney-client privilege being pierced under the crime fraud exception, this does not bode well for Donald Trump to try to prove that he did not have the level of intent that a prosecutor needs to show.

CAMEROTA: So, if this reporting bears out, and we've heard bits of pieces of this before, and Jack Smith, the special counsel, has evidence of this. Does Merrick Garland charge Donald Trump?

COATES: Well, remember he is not the first one to make the call. It would be the person that he has given and delegated the responsibility to, Jack Smith, in part because of the political implications here. Obviously, Donald Trump is the presumed front-runner in the GOP primary. He's a former president. He has made no small news about the idea that he believes all of this is a perpetual witch hunt.

And so there is a distant ten-foot pole that Merrick Garland wants to have between himself for obvious reason, the political appointee, the head of the executive branch under the pleasure of President Biden, the chief rival of the GOP primary lead, and, of course, what's happening in this investigation. But if Jack Smith, who has had the delegated authority to make the decision, makes that determination, it really binds Merrick Garland as the A.G. to make a decision based on what the evidence shows under the special counsel whose job it is to look at this.

And so it is very likely in a case where there's not a whole lot of ambiguity, unlike some other cases that might be brewing, if there's zero ambiguity and the evidence is there, Merrick Garland will likely have to follow the guidance of Jack Smith, whatever it might be.

[22:05:07]

CAMEROTA: Okay. And the two staffers who reportedly moved these boxes of documents, are they in trouble?

COATES: It could be. I mean, we've never seen -- I haven't seen a photograph if you have of Donald Trump carrying boxes anywhere. I haven't seen him carrying the documents or to have some indication that he himself was alone in this. If he delegated responsibility to somebody else, if that person is involved in this, then there is the potential liability and potential prosecution.

However, think about there might be people who are voluntarily or actively cooperating to give the information, to convey that there is likely there was a dress rehearsal or otherwise. And I point again to Evan Corcoran. Remember, he was the attorney for Donald Trump. He tried to suggest he could not tell what may have been instructed to him or otherwise because of obviously the attorney-client privilege. We want any client to be able to be forthright and to be candid with their counsel to get legal advice. And we will shield those communications, Alisyn, except if there's a crime or fraud afoot.

And, yes, I said afoot on a Thursday night at 10:00 P.M. But, really, if there was a crime afoot and fraud happening, we don't want to protect that. We don't want to use a shield of an attorney to further a crime. And so a judge has already said you're going to have to testify about what you may have been instructed to in front of a grand jury.

And so he apparently had very detailed notes. Whatever was contained in that secret grand jury proceeding will give us more insight as to who else might be liable or at least potentially heading to prosecution.

CAMEROTA: It sounds like something is afoot, maybe even two feet. So, thank you very much --

COATES: I knew you were going to say it. I knew it, Alisyn. I knew you were going to say it.

CAMEROTA: I knew that you knew that I was going to say something cheesy right there.

COATES: I was right there with you.

CAMEROTA: Fantastic, great to see you. Thank you very much for all of that.

COATES: Nice to see you, too.

CAMEROTA: I'm going to go back to the panel. Errol, the idea that the boxes were moved after they knew the FBI was coming, okay, they knew that they were being subpoenaed for this, and, furthermore, that he kept some of these -- I mean, obviously, they have evidence, or they have sources to say that he kept some of these documents in the open and showed them to people. You'll remember in the CNN town hall that he was asked about this by Kaitlan Collins, and his answer was a little peculiar. So, let me just play that for everyone.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: When it comes to your documents, did you ever show those classified documents to anyone?

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Not really. I would have the right to. By the way, they were declassified after --

COLLINS: What do you mean, not really?

TRUMP: Not that I can think of.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: That sounds like the kind of thing you say under oath. This is Donald Trump during that town hall and in other settings has been trying out every defense that comes to mind. I can automatically do it just by an act of my mind. I didn't really show it to anybody, not really, I don't remember.

CAMEROTA: But I could if I wanted to.

LOUIS: But I could if I wanted to, right. He often has this habit of doing things in the open and trying to inoculate those actions by saying, clearly, I wasn't trying to deceive everybody. I just laid it out there and everybody could see the boxes. That was something else he said during the town hall. Everybody saw the boxes. What are you talking about? I'm not trying to do anything that's improper or illegal.

So, the problem for him, of course, is that that doesn't really comport with the law. When the National Archives comes and asks or when a subpoena is executed and the Justice Department shows up, you're supposed to cooperate. And the non-cooperation itself give rise to an offense. So, that even if everything he said was true, if he thought he could magically mentally declassify things, once the DOJ comes and says, we have a subpoena, you have to give this stuff back and you don't do it or you have a rehearsal to sort of pretend you're going to do it, you get into a lot of trouble. And I think he's heading for a lot of legal trouble.

CAMEROTA: Rachel?

RACHEL NICHOLS, HOST, HEADLINERS WITH RACHEL NICHOLS ON SHOWTIME: Look, the obstruction is one thing. And, by the way, news at 11:00, Donald Trump doesn't have respect for American laws or procedure. I mean, we already knew that. So, can they prove obstruction, can they prove intent with this information? Maybe. It certainly looks like it from the outside. We'll have to see what the legal process bears out.

To me it's the showing people of these documents that really just sort of erupts red flags for me. We are talking about documents that have been reported as nuclear codes, national security about operations that even our top national operatives don't know about. That's how secure these overseas operations are. And he's just showing them to business associates and friends, what, to feed his own ego so he can say how important he is?

That to me is where the American electorate needs to really pay attention. Because it's not about the charges or, gee, is it this legal case or that legal case, he is being reckless with American lives.

[22:10:02]

That's just the bottom line. Whether he thought he was allowed to or not, you look at what's in front of you and you show people, and that's something that can get people killed. And what happens if he gets back into office and he is that reckless on behalf of his ego, which, gee, it's just not a hard leap to think that that might happen again.

CAMEROTA: Jason, there's the process of it, which is why where these things being moved around, why was he keeping them when he knew that the National Archives needed them, why was he may be showing it to them, and then, as Rachel was alluding, to what's on the -- what are these documents, why did he want to keep them? Donald Trump prides himself obviously on being a great deal maker. Did he want to make a deal with them? What was he doing with these?

JASON OSBORNE, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Well, first off, when the story came out, the first thing I could think of was like what does it dress rehearsal look like of taking boxes at Mar-a-Lago. Like who's officiating this and --

S.E. CUPP, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Obstruction. It looks like obstruction.

OSBORNE: No. But, I mean, even just from a more comedy side of it, it's like what are they --

CUPP: Do you know what people are wearing? Like what do you --

OSBORNE: No. Just like -- whose -- like, okay, we're going to practice moving this box from this room to this room, let's see what it looks like, right? Can you move faster?

But in terms of your question and your point, it's like I have no idea what these documents could be. I know what we've heard is that they could be codes. I have to think there were some pretty smart people that came in the new administration, like we're changing everything, so that no matter what was on these documents, it's no longer valid. I also think it's kind of stupid, quite frankly, on Trump's part to say, no, these documents were declassified and there's nothing a big deal about it. The National Archives knows what those documents are because he never created anything himself. And that's not just him. It's any president or any elected official. Somebody else creates the document and gives it to him.

CAMEROTA: Yes, that's how they knew he still had boxes of them because they have a list that were missing. So, yes, I think they are aware even more so than we are of what exactly it was.

OSBORNE: And I'm not convinced quite -- just a last point. I'm not convinced that the documents are going to be what Jack Smith ends up focusing on. I think there's other stuff, because keep in mind, the independent counsel can actually look at other things.

CAMEROTA: Yes, like what?

OSBORNE: From what I understand there's been folks that have been talked to from DHS and from DOD about things that what happened after the election. I don't know what they are and, obviously, nobody is going to tell someone like me. But I think the investigation is more than just the classified documents.

CAMEROTA: Well, he is also looking into the January 6th, the seeds of the election interference, et cetera, et cetera. Go ahead.

CUPP: Well, I mean, it's not hard to imagine Donald Trump collecting these things. It's like trinkets and trophies, right? I mean, that feels very in his persona. But what I think is really interesting here is whether or not there will be political implications from this, right? Like on Earth One, this would be bad for someone running for president, right?

CAMEROTA: Well, I seem to recall that Hillary Clinton was occasionally --

CUPP: Disqualifying for her, lock her up.

CAMEROTA: Well, I mean, it was Donald Trump who was so outraged that she might have had some classified documents on her home server, and he brought it up all the time.

CUPP: And listen, that was bad. That was bad.

CAMEROTA: Yes. And you know what he said about it at the time? Do we have what Donald Trump said about -- okay, listen to this just to remind you, S.E.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We can't have someone in the Oval Office who doesn't understand the meaning of the word confidential or classified.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: There you have it.

CUPP: There's a video for everything. But what's interesting is this should be disqualifying. Of course, in today's Republican Party on Earth Two, it is a windfall. And it is wild to me. Ron DeSantis today said he'd consider pardoning Donald Trump because of all the FBI deep state coming to get you, witch hunt stuff. Ron DeSantis wants to beat Donald Trump. Ron DeSantis wants Trump to be disqualified so that Ron DeSantis can win. And yet you can't say what is obvious to a five- year-old in this Republican primary and this Earth Two Republican Party. It's wild.

CAMEROTA: Thank you for giving us the report from Earth, because we do need that reality check. Thank you all very much.

All right, now to this, an 11-year-old boy calls 911 for help when his mother fears for his safety, and he's shot in the chest by a police officer. Now, the family is calling for that officer to be fired. We have more on the investigation, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: An 11-year-old boy called police for help and ended up getting shot by an officer. 11-year-old Aderrien Murry called 911 in the middle of the night because of a domestic disturbance at his home. But when police showed up, they accidentally shot Aderrien in the chest. His mother describes the chaos.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MURRY: I walked towards the end of my driveway where my mom was, and I heard a shot and I saw my son run out towards where we were. He ran from the inside of the house all the way out to where we were, and that's when he felt bleeding, shot. And I put pressure on the -- I put pressure on it to stop help stop the bleeding, it bleeding so much. I asked the cop, I thought, what happened? He told me he shot my son, that he thought he didn't know. He came around a corner. There were no real explanations of what happened.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: We're happy to say Aderrien survived. We're told he's recovering from his injuries, but his mother is demanding that the responding officer, Greg Capers, be fired and charged. He is on paid leave as this investigation continues.

We're back with the panel. We also have CNN Chief Law Enforcement Analyst John Miller with us. John explain how something like this can happen.

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, something like this can't happen, but it did. So, then you have to reach into what was going through the officer's mind when he pulled the trigger.

And we don't know enough about this. We're told it's on body camera, so we could possibly learn a lot more about it once authorities kind of go through that footage, interview everybody who was on the scene, interview whatever other officers were on the scene.

[22:20:00]

But I've investigated in New York and Los Angeles, literally scores of police shootings from the outset. And when you look at a case like this, his statement about the boy came around the corner quickly, and I fired, has some of the earmarks of an accidental discharge.

And that's why I have to get into what was in the officer's mind, because when the 911 call was given to them, did they say, okay, my ex-husband is here, it's 04:00 in the morning. He says, let's get everybody out of the house, into the driveway, let's clear the house and he's startled and fires that shot. I've seen that before. It's where you're not supposed to have your finger in the trigger guard and you flinch out of fear and a shot goes off, you didn't intend to fire.

Either way, the question is going to be what is the officer statement? What does the body camera show? And, frankly, can he go on being a police officer? He's been in the U.S. military. He's been a police officer there for a while. He has another incident with the same lawyer.

CAMEROTA: I was going to ask about that. So, do we know about his background? Does he have some bad judgment in his past, do you know?

MILLER: So, that other incident, it's not clear whether that resulted in discipline or not, but the lawyer says he had a client who was tased while handcuffed. So, you're going to have to do the entire 360 degree look at this officer's career. But the shooting of an 11-year- old boy, you see this child. There's no way to mistake him for the ex- husband or anybody else. This is clearly an issue where there's going to be a question about -- there's going to be two questions. One, does he have to be prosecuted, and that's going to be based on what the camera shows and what he says, but then the other is, can he go on being a police officer?

CUPP: Well, this is a sad story all around. I have to assume this police officer didn't intentionally shoot a child. I'm also really glad that this child is going to be okay physically. Mentally, I'm sure not. Look, I am a big supporter of law enforcement, but I don't support anything blindly. And there have been a not small number of these accidental discharges or accidental shootings.

And I think it's something that really needs to be looked at as we're talking, talking more about criminal justice reform and police brutality. And I don't know that that fits in this category, but we're looking at a large category. This cannot happen. And stuff like this seems to happen too frequently. And that cannot be the collateral damage of law enforcement just doing their job. It cannot be.

CAMEROTA: Does it feel like officers when something like this happens, Errol, does it feel to you like they're scared? There's something about training that has gone wrong and they're scared.

LOUIS: There's something about training and systems that has gone wrong, you know what I mean? For example, if the 911 call came from an 11-year-old, somewhere in that system, that information should have been transmitted to the responding officer, that there's an 11-year- old who called, that person is going to be there.

CUPP: And other children and the --

LOUIS: So, that you're not there. And if you're scared and you're flinching, this is reminiscent of that horrible case in 2014, Tamir Rice in Cleveland, where a 911 call goes in and says, there's a kid here. It's probably a play gun, but he's hanging around in this playground. The cops show up and something like three seconds later, they zoom up, they pop out of the car and they killed the child. And it turned out that the officer --

MILLER: He was a little kid.

LOUIS: He was a really little kid. And it turned out the officer had had a whole string of problems, had been sort of kicked off another force. And it raised a lot of systemic questions about how the 911 call was handled, the training of the responding officers, and then there's this other issue out there about do people who have bad disciplinary records, are they able to just move from department to department. So, all of those kind of questions are going to be raised all over again.

And, of course, your heart has to go out. Those of us who have sons, you spend so much time, everything from the day of birth to the vaccinations, to you watch their little bodies growing, and to have someone shot at close range like that, it's just devastating.

CAMEROTA: Yes, we've called -- CNN has called this police department to try to get information. They haven't returned our calls. And this is -- we've seen when police departments have done something really well, and they have transparency, and they open up their records to try to fix whatever the problem is, and then we've seen them when they don't.

NICHOLS: Well, look, it's hard as a citizen, as a parent, to think there could be any reason that this officer would shoot this child. It's hard to imagine. But if you have one, tell me what it is. And every day that body cam footage doesn't come out, and it's been multiple days, that tells me you have no reason.

And, by the way, being scared, he came around a corner, not a reason to shoot someone. I think we've gotten so off topic here sometimes when talking about shootings, the incident that happened here on the New York subway, someone was being threatening.

[22:25:02]

Okay. That's not a capital offense. So, I'm scared by a little boy, a 4'10 boy coming around a corner, that's not an excuse, that's not okay. If it was two regular people, someone came around a corner at me, so I shot them, we wouldn't let that stand. That person would go to jail. The threshold for a police officer has to be higher, not lower than for a regular citizen. And, by the way, he knew that -- the report came in that there were children in the house. That was part of the disturbance. And if you are a police officer responding to that situation, you are supposed to be trained for the nuance that you were trying to get the assailant and not the victims. That doesn't seem so difficult to me. And it's just mysterious that this has dragged on for as many days as it has. I feel awful for this poor family.

CAMEROTA: All right, thank you all very much for all of those perspectives.

Now to this, college enrollment is down by a million students. So, what is behind that? Is it the pandemic? Is it the expense? Mike Rowe of Dirty Jobs has a lot of thoughts on this, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[22:30:00]

CAMEROTA: If you have a kid going to college in September, this story will come as a shock to you. There are nearly one million fewer students enrolled in American colleges than there were just in 2019.

According to a new report, the number of undergraduates at nonprofit four-year institutions continues to slide down. So what's the explanation?

Well, Mike Rowe, the man behind Dirty Jobs and the CEO of the Mike Rowe Works Foundation is here to tell us. Mike, great to see you. Mike, as a parent with two seniors who are going off to college in September, it felt as competitive as ever. I was stunned to hear that there are a million fewer kids enrolling than than there were in pre- pandemic levels. So what do you think is going on?

MIKE ROWE, CEO, MIKEROWEWORKS FOUNDATION: Well, selfishly, I hope that the drum we've been beating for the last 15 years over at mikeroweWORKS might be having some impact. I'm not affirmatively trying to dissuade people from considering a college education. I've been, on the other hand, trying to get people to look at all of the options that are available and be really, really honest about the cost. Never has anything in the history of Western civilization gotten more expensive more quickly than a four year degree in the last 30 years. It's exponential, you know, it's increased faster than food, energy, real estate, healthcare, really everything.

And so it's got a long tail, this thing, but I think the numbers have finally caught up with a lot of households who have simply said, look, if we can get our kid in a trade school and have him or her, learn a skill that's actually in demand and get out with very little debt, that kid's going to have a colossal head start in the workforce. And that's just the data, and that's just the facts. And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't just a little gratified to see the headlines catch up with my own smack.

CAMEROTA: No, seriously, when I read this, I thought, oh, my gosh, the world has caught up with my growth, with what you've been telling us for years. But do you think this is, was this brought on by the pandemic or do you really think it's just the sticker shock finally being prohibitive for so many families?

ROWE: Yes, yes, and probably a bunch more things too. This thing is, it's like nailing jello to a tree. I mean, it's very difficult to pin down exactly what the underlying problem is and what the overarching solution might be. Personally, I think we can walk it all the way back to that ridiculous day we pulled shop class out of high schools and started telling kids that the best path for the most people was the most expensive path. Since then, a lot of unintended consequences have started to evolve and a lot of myths and misperceptions and stigmas and stereotypes around the trades have taken hold. I think what we're starting to see now is a slow realization that no, wait, you actually can make six figures welding.

You don't really have to go 150 grand in the hole to come out with a skill that makes you incredibly marketable. So the facts are starting to catch up. The evidence demands a verdict, right? And the evidence is coming in.

CAMEROTA: And yet there is still evidence that a four-year traditional college degree will pay off more than just a high school graduation certificate. So here are the numbers, lifetime earnings by educational attainment, less than high, well, let's go to high school. So high school diploma, 1.6 million lifetime earnings versus a bachelor's degree, 2.8 million.

ROWE: Mm-hmm. Well, if it were that binary, everybody would make a simple decision and we wouldn't be having this conversation. There wouldn't be $1.7 trillion in outstanding student loans. There wouldn't be literally millions of kids with degrees who can't find work in their chosen field. The thing that's not really on that chart, I mean, it alludes to it, but the number of people who start college and don't finish is colossal.

And when those people drop out, they don't drop out with a clean slate. They drop out with a lot of debt and no degree to apply it toward. So look, macroeconomics is not my thing. mikeroweWORKS is my thing. And the only thing I can really tell you with absolute definitiveness is that we've helped 1800 people master a skill that's in demand. And Alisyn, they're killing it.

I mean, I've come to the conclusion that I can tell an OK story, but if we're trying to persuade a guidance counselor or a mom or a dad to give the trades an honest look, we need to hear from people who are prospering in their fields right now.

Women in particular are killing it. We've got, I don't even know the percentage of people in my foundation that we've assisted that are female has exponentially jumped and jumped again.

[22:35:08]

CAMEROTA: Like what kind of jobs, Mike --

ROWE: We've got female welders making 80. CAMEROTA: -- Yeah, female welders. Tell us what kind of jobs you're

helping them with.

ROWE: So my favorite story is Chloe Hudson who applied for a work ethic scholarship five years ago. She was this close to borrowing a few hundred grand to become a plastic surgeon. She decided to weld instead. She wound up at Joe Gibbs, she's the lead welder there making mid six figures, story after story after story. Welders don't look like the person you're imagining in your mind right now. Not every plumber is 300 pounds with a giant butt crack in a sitcom, right?

Those are the stigmas I'm talking about. Those are the perceptions and the misperceptions that a lot of well intended parents have. And look, guidance counselors to this day, in real time as we speak, they're getting boned based on their ability to help a kid get into a four- year school, not into a trade school.

So again, it's not this is good and this is bad or this is better and this is worse, but trade jobs are not vocational consolation prizes.

And the path to a four-year degree, look, you can look at the numbers, but when you really get down and tell the individual stories, some will break your heart and some will inspire you. But in the end, work ethic still matters, and the willingness to master a skill that's in demand, maybe out of favor a little bit, but nevertheless in demand, that will still get you to a place that looks a lot like prosperity.

CAMEROTA: Well, as I said, Mike, you've been singing this tune for a long time and now there's a chorus of people joining you. So always great to talk to you. Thanks so much for being on the program. See you soon.

Shameless plug, a million bucks coming up in a couple of months, we're gonna give it away again for the next round. But thank you so much for having me.

CAMEROTA: Can't wait to hear about it.

All right, have you heard of this so-called miracle drug Ozempic? It helps people lose weight, but it turns out it might also help with a whole bunch of other things. We're going to discuss that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[22:40:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: What is the deal with Ozempic? Why do people consider it a miracle drug for weight loss and maybe even other things?

I'm back with my panel and CNN medical correspondent Meg Tirrell joins us now. So Meg, how does it work? How does Ozempic work? Does it just suppress your appetite or is there something else magical happening?

MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, so there's something magical that's happening but essentially it goes after a target that's known as GLP-1 and it works really well. It does end up suppressing your appetite. It has to do with insulin. Some people think it can slow the emptying of your stomach so that you feel full for longer.

And what they have found is that with Ozempic and then a drug called Wegovy, which is the same drug, but just in a higher dose, which is actually approved for weight loss, they've seen 15 percent weight loss in clinical trials with these medicines. There's another one called Mounjaro, which is a different drug called Terzepotide. And in trials for type two diabetes and for obesity, they've seen 22 percent weight loss.

CAMEROTA: Over the space of how long?

TIRRELL: 72 weeks. So a little bit more than a year and some.

CAMEROTA: Ok, that's interesting because Jason you were telling me you did Ozepic for two months?

JASON OSBORNE, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Two months.

CAMEROTA: And did you lose weight?

OSBORNE: I did. Within the first three weeks I think I lost like ten pounds. Right? And then they kind of stalled for a little while.

CAMEROTA: And was it easy? Were there side effects?

OSBORNE: I didn't have any side effects necessarily. To her point about the emptying of the summer without getting too graphic, I think there were some things that just didn't empty as normally they did before.

S.E. CUPP, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: That is the nicest way I've heard of it being emptied.

TIRRELL: Let's discuss that on national television.

CAMEROTA: : But overall you were happy with the results.

OSBORNE: I was happy and I wouldn't necessarily say it suppressed my appetite. It was just I felt fuller when I was eating. Right?

CAMEROTA: OK. And why did you go off it?

OSBORNE: Because insurance didn't cover it for me. Now, my family has a history of diabetes. And so I was pre-diabetic. Still am, I think. And they wouldn't cover it. And so I had to pay out of pocket for it. And I just didn't want to pay anymore. Now, if they keep adding things that it's going to stop doing, like I told you earlier, if it gets my hair back and forward and I'm back on it. I mean I'll-

CAMEROTA: Well that's funny because now they are finding that there are other additional benefits of it. For instance, is it helping with various addictions? TIRRELL: So this is something that people have sort of noticed as they've been taking the drug, and it is being tested formally in clinical trials right now. So we can't say, absolutely, if you take this, you're not gonna have your addictive behaviors anymore.

But one of the things that doctors have told me they've noticed mostly in patients is people lose interest in drinking. So that's one thing in particular. But there's also just a story in "The Atlantic" which detailed people stop nail biting. Maybe they don't do compulsive shopping quite as much.

And so scientists are trying to understand what it is about these medicines, what they're doing that could potentially be causing this. And then maybe could this be a drug for that as well.

CAMEROTA: Rachel, you live in L.A., you have some experience hearing about this drug?

RACHEL NICHOLS, HOST, HEADLINERS WITH RACHEL NICHOLS ON SHOWTIME: Yeah, it's amazing. I've never done it, but I would say 25, because S.C. and I were talking in the break, I would say 25 percent of the people who I run into have had some sort of weight loss, and you say, ah, you look great. And they say, Ozempic, or they say, Mounjaro.

And it's become one of these things where in certain places, it's just accepted. It's not even being whispered anymore, the expense is obviously an issue. It's about $1,000 a month.

And I think this is yet another case where rich people in this country have access to better health care than people who are not able to afford that kind of thing. And yet you see obesity in this country. Two in five adults are considered obese. One in five children are considered obese. We know about all the secondary conditions that come with obesity. You talk about being pre-diabetic.

{22:45:06]

So there's a little bit of this sort of push and pull in American society of you shouldn't need a drug, right? You shouldn't need a cheat. You should be able to have the willpower. You should be able to stop eating without a drug making you feel like you're more full. Well, the bottom line is it's not happening. Portions in this country are four times the size that they are in Europe.

And if we have something that can help people take better care of themselves and stop those secondary conditions, I think people have to take a serious look at it. It's not just a vanity thing.

CAMEROTA: And S.C., when you see people and they've lost a dramatic or significant amount of weight. Do they look better? Because I've also heard there's something called ozempic face.

CUPP: Yeah. Well, listen, you're not supposed to lose weight that quickly. And when you do, you can get a lot of sagging. And that can happen in your face. It can happen elsewhere too. I've seen some people I know have to deal with a lot of extra skin because you're supposed to lose weight more slowly. But yeah, I know a lot of people on this, especially in television and reality television, a lot of people are on it. They're not whispering about it anymore.

And I think there's a lot of people who need this drug and then a lot of people just want this drug.

And I worry from a place having come from childhood with eating disorders and all of that I worry it's sort of reawakening this culture of thin that we had really tried to eradicate for many many years, you know, restoring healthy body image body positivity, and now you're seeing like thin is back in. I just worry that this is gonna creep down to teenage girls who watch these reality stars and you know who want the -- the magic pill, the magic drug to make them as thin as their mom is now or as thin as, right, their favorite TV star is. So I just worry about that side of it. I'm glad it's helping a lot of people, but there's another side to it.

CAMEROTA: Do you worry about that, Meg?

TIRRELL: Oh, yeah. I think there are people who think that all of the discussion that's happening around this really could trigger eating disorder type behaviors. And I think there is a lot of concern that that could be very problematic. And you have seen a real shift that people are now talking about this, like how great it is that I'm not hungry, that I never eat that I have the appetite of a toddler, I think was one phrase in one big story about these medicines. And so there is concern about when people are using this when it's not indicated.

CUPP: Well, and you have people like Gwyneth Paltrow and Hilary Duff talking about their starvation diets and that's not even with pills. Then you think, well, this is a pill, it's approved. This must be okay and good for me. I would hope it's not being given to kids, right? But you know, it's not hard to get your hands on stuff these days.

So, I just hope, there's also an educational aspect to this as it's growing in need and popularity.

CAMEROTA: Yeah, really interesting. Thank you very much for the expertise.

TIRRELL: Thanks, you guys.

CAMEROTA: Great to talk to you.

All right, the age-old question, crushed ice or cubed ice? What about nugget ice? What is that anyway? It's something it's -- is it a scam or is it something that Starbucks is switching to and it has the internet in tizzy? We're gonna talk about the Ice Wars coming up.

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[22:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) CAMEROTA: Americans have strong feelings about ice. And thanks to Starbucks, those feelings are on display. Starbucks announced they're changing the ice they use in their drinks. They're going from chipped ice to, quote, "nugget ice." And people are losing their minds.

I'm back with Jason Osborne and Rachel Nichols. Okay, all right, so this is chipped ice, right? Which looks like little cubes. These are little cubes, but they're little like squares. And then nugget ice is just smaller like crushed ice.

NICHOLS: It's like the soft kind of, you can kind of, you know, chew on it or it's more chewy. You can, yes, right.

OSBORNE: Yeah, it's more like a pellet.

CAMEROTA: It's not more chewy. It's just crushed ice.

NICHOLS: Yeah, but you can, you can get softer.

OSBORNE: And it's not as loud though as this.

NICHOLS: It's softer.

CAMEROTA: This is louder ice?

OSBORNE: Yeah, try and bite down on that and then it sounds like you're gonna break a tooth. This should have been in everybody's kitchen from the get-go.

NICHOLS: Yes --

OSBORNE: Like this right here.

NICHOLS: -- this is better, the new ice is better.

CAMEROTA: The new ice that is smaller, nugget ice is better. You guys are happy that Starbucks is --

OSBORNE: 100 percent.

NICHOLS: Yeah.

OSBORNE: Sonic, you know, in the South, this is all they sell with their lemonade and strawberry lemonade.

NICHOLS: Look, let's just cut to the chase. This is serial killer ice, right? This is happy ice. And we're missing two other kinds of ice.

CAMEROTA: Oh, what are they?

NICHOLS: Okay. So you have the big giant blocks of ice that you get in your cocktail.

CAMEROTA: Yeah. And those are great.

NICHOLS: That's sexy. That's great. You want that. CAMEROTA: That's sexy because it's not watering down your drink. It's

just cooling down your drink. It's just not watering it down.

NICHOLS: It's just your happy, right? And then there's

CAMEROTA: Like that block ice.

NICHOLS: And then there's -- wait, exactly -- and then there's what I like to call doing too much ice, which is if you're on TikTok or Instagram, there's a whole trend right now in particular of people freezing things into their large blocks of ice. So people will take like a rose, they'll cut off right at the bud, they'll put the rose in the giant ice block, put water in it, freeze it, and then put it on display with their champagne or put it in their cocktail drink.

CAMEROTA: I think that's all.

OSBORNE: It's too much time.

NICHOLS: Again, doing too much ice. That is what that ice is called. Nobody should be doing that.

CAMEROTA: Got it, got it. So you guys have thought a lot about--

NICHOLS: This is God's Ice

CAMEROTA: -- this, God's ice. The nugget ice finally. We've advanced as a civilization enough, you're saying, to have nugget ice.

OSBORNE: And if I had one recommendation for Bud Light is package your Bud Light in this ice and they'd win back every voter.

CAMEROTA: But are you saying to water down Bud Light?

OSBORNE: No, no. Put your Bud Light in some pellet ice.

CAMEROTA: Yup.

OSBORNE: And I think conservatives would forget all about that. Right, yeah.

NICHOLS: I mean, I used to only be on the outside. And by the way, it's really only Americans who put it inside. And we are scorned for it all over the globe.

[22:55:01]

But I don't care. I stand proudly.

CAMEROTA: You guys have thought a lot about this, I can tell.

NICHOLS: It's an important topic, Alisyn.

OSBORNE: When you go to Circle K now in the south, you have two options. You have this ice or you have the pellet ice. Everybody gravitates towards the pellet ice. CAMEROTA: Thank goodness you guys have cleared this up and have educated me about this. I really appreciate you guys being here.

OSBORNE: Do we get to take this with us?

CAMEROTA: You do.

NICHOLS: But not this one.

CAMEROTA: You can take the nugget ice.

NICHOLS: Nobody wants that.

CAMEROTA: No, you can have that garbage ice.

OSBORNE: That's for the next hour.

CAMEROTA: Exactly. I'll let these guys, the reporters, who don't know about it, have that kind of ice. Thank you guys, great to see you.

OSBORNE: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: All right, coming up, some of our favorite reporters are here to talk about the stories that they're working on for tomorrow. Little do they know what kind of ice we're about to give them. Hi, guys.

NICHOLS: Hi.

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