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FBI Conducts Court-Authorized Search at John Bolton's Home; U.N.- Backed Group Declared Famine in Parts of Gaza City. Aired 10:39-11a ET

Aired August 22, 2025 - 10:39   ET

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

[10:39:00]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

ELENI GIOKOS, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Welcome to CONNECT THE WORLD. I'm Eleni Giokos, and we continue to follow breaking news.

The FBI is conducting a court authorized search at the Maryland home of President Donald Trump's former National Security adviser, John Bolton. In

recent years, Bolton has become a vocal critic of the president and in the 2020 -- in 2020, rather, he published a tell-all book about his time

serving in the Trump White House during his first term.

Two sources say the search is connected to a national security investigation into whether Bolton disclosed classified information in the

book and outside of the book. A short time ago, President Trump talked about Bolton and the search.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: He's a -- not a smart guy, but he could be a very unpatriotic. I mean, we're going to find out. I know

nothing about it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GIOKOS: I want to bring in Corey Brettschneider, a political science professor at Brown University.

[10:40:02]

Corey, thanks so much for joining us today. And we're watching this, search, this raid, continuing at John Bolton's home, also what used to be

his office.

What is your take on this? How are you characterizing what we're seeing playing out today?

COREY BRETTSCHNEIDER, POLITICAL SCIENCE PROFESSOR, BROWN UNIVERSITY: Well, you just heard the president of the United States say that he believes that

he's the chief law enforcement officer, that he can initiate prosecutions. And now after that, as he thinly denies that this is a political

prosecution, he says he didn't want to know about it. It's so obvious that that's exactly what's happening.

On the "Oath in the Office" podcast, my new podcast, I've been talking about the transition that we're watching now from a soft coup to a hard

coup. Part of that, of course, is the militarization of Washington, D.C., but it also is the hallmark of authoritarianism of a hard coup is the

prosecution of political opponents. And the president essentially, if you listen to him carefully or even not that carefully, he was saying that's

exactly what's going on.

GIOKOS: I mean, he also said that he wasn't aware that his home was going to be searched. I want to kind of go through this from a legal perspective.

What we're seeing now, it's just search. We know that it pertains to classified information, information that was released during -- for the

memoir, John Bolton's memoir. Now, we're also understanding from sources that it could also have also been shared with media and also perhaps other

clients.

What kind of recourse, what kind of legal recourse are we looking at here in terms, I don't want to get ahead of ourselves, but at the same time,

important to discuss what kind of charges he could potentially face?

BRETTSCHNEIDER: Well, there's a possibility -- I should say, too, that the way that the criminal law works is there are a number of laws on the books,

and one of the things that prosecutors have to do is to decide whether to charge and what to charge. So I suppose that in terms of the charges they

might come up with, that includes espionage laws in the extreme laws limiting disclosure of classified information/

You could go through a list of possibilities here. But I do think it's so essential to not just think about this in the narrow legal sense because

while you could charge anything, anybody could be charged with any crime at any point as an accusation, the question is whether or not it's grounded in

fact and grounded in law, and when you have the president of the United States, that's the headline here, talking about prosecuting political

opponents, initiating prosecutions, and then, exactly as you say, he claimed, too, to not know what was going on.

But I think that's a thin veneer here, that it's clear that this is being directed subtly or not so subtly to prosecute a political opponent. So,

yes, there are charges, you know, when you -- when you prosecute a political opponent, you don't do so just willy-nilly by locking them up. We

still have judges in this country and some semblance of the rule of law. But the question is whether or not you use that weakness of our system that

gives enormous discretion to prosecutors in order to come up with false charges, and that -- that's my worry here.

He was, of course, cleared of this investigation already. They looked into it, and now it's coming back. And we have to ask why this kind of

selectivity?

GIOKOS: Yes.

BRETTSCHNEIDER: I'll say something about history. The founders really worried about this. They considered, in fact, an independently elected

attorney general. That's what New York's system was and is still. And yet they thought, let's just trust a president that they won't prosecute

political opponents. And now you're seeing exactly the opposite.

GIOKOS: Yes. And we've got Katelyn Polantz standing by. And I know you've been working your sources all day. So I want to start off with that. Have

we -- do we have anything new that you've perhaps heard from, heard of around this raid, but also importantly, Katelyn, we've also seen social

media posts by the attorney general, by the FBI director. There's so much that's been going on in the last few hours.

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: And some comments by the president himself just a few minutes ago, saying that he

has not been briefed by the Justice Department yet on this, and that he knows nothing. He tells the attorney general, you have to do what you have

to do. But of course, Donald Trump also remarked that, "I could have started" actually able to be the one starting it because he is the chief

law enforcement officer of the United States. That's what he just said.

What we know so far is we're gaining a portrait of what an investigation that would still be quite secret and ongoing in the court system is at this

time. We know that it is a national security (INAUDIBLE). The retention of classified records tied to John Bolton's work and publication of his 2020

book. And we also know now, through reporting from our own Kristen Holmes at the White House, that the investigators may be looking at the disclosure

of classified information or national security information Bolton would know outside of the work he did on that 2020 memoir about his term as

National Security adviser in the first Trump presidency.

[10:45:19]

That possibility of disclosure, what they would be looking at, is the potential that Bolton shared information he maybe should not have with

clients or members of the media. So that is a little bit different than what we knew about the investigation, that was a grand jury investigation

in 2020, following the release of the book, and that resulted in no charges.

Whether this will result in charges this time around, still a major question and one we may not have an answer to right now. So far, this is

investigative activity. The director of the FBI, Kash Patel writing today, "No one is above the law." FBI agents on mission this morning as of 7:

a.m., right before we saw that activity begin at John Bolton's house in Maryland.

GIOKOS: All right. Katelyn Polantz, Corey Brettschneider, thank you so much for that update.

We continue to cover this breaking news story, and we'll be back in just a moment. Stick with CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GIOKOS: Welcome back. Now famine has been declared in parts of Gaza, including Gaza City. That verdict comes from the IPC, a United Nations

backed group that monitors food security. Its report says the areas experiencing famine are expected to expand.

Throughout the two-year war, Israel has at times either fully or partially cut off aid entering Gaza. At least 270 people -- 271 people have starved

to death, 112 of them were children. Most of the deaths have occurred in recent weeks as the enclave hit its breaking point. The U.N.'s emergency

relief coordinator is urging the world to take note.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM FLETCHER, UNITED NATIONS EMERGENCY RELIEF COORDINATOR: Please read the IPC report, cover to cover. Read it in sorrow and in anger, not as words

and numbers, but as names and lives. Be in no doubt that this is irrefutable testimony. It is a famine. The Gaza famine. It is a famine that

we could have prevented if we had been allowed. Yet food stacks up at borders because of systematic obstruction by Israel.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GIOKOS: All right. So CNN's Nic Robertson is live in Jerusalem for us.

And then you had Tom Fletcher there saying it's irrefutable, there is a famine in Gaza. The Israelis are saying, they basically dismissing this

report. We've seen the images, Nic. We've been covering the stories. People are severely undernourished. We've heard about the deaths. Give me a sense

here of, you know, Israel's response to this report and also some of what you and your colleagues have seen at the border where food is lined up in

trucks and just can't get through.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: And food is sort of in the central zone in technically inside of Gaza, but the U.N. and their

distribution trucks and teams inside of Gaza cannot get the security clearance, cannot get to the -- get to those aid buildups of aid to

distribute it.

[10:50:12]

That's been typical of what we're seeing. And the IDF and COGAT, the Israeli body that oversees the distribution of aid, says this is, A, on the

U.N. and the distribution process, and B, on Hamas. It's not on them. COGAT says it's doing its job. The prime minister's office today has said that

since the beginning of the war, they've distributed two million tons of aid into Gaza.

The situation that the IPC describes is a dire situation that they describe as manmade, entirely preventable in the Gaza governorate. 132,000 children

under the under the age of five are at risk of death through malnutrition. The prime minister's office calls this a lie that Israel has an intent to

starve people this way.

The British Foreign secretary has described the situation as horrible and called on Israel to make sure and get aid into Gaza.

GIOKOS: All right. Nic Robertson, thank you so much for that update.

I want to go now live to Gaza City and join Yousra Abu Sharekh, who is the Gaza program coordinator for INARA, the International Network for Aid,

Relief and Assistance, founded by former CNN correspondent Arwa Damon.

Thank you so much for joining us. It's such an important time to have this conversation, Yusra, because the IPC finally declaring famine in Gaza. And

we know there are various phases. We know that there's been acute hunger, there's been emergency phase and so forth. And many have said this was

basically inevitable. But what do you believe the report highlights that is important for the international community, and as Tom Fletcher was talking

about, to take action immediately to alleviate the scenario.

YOUSRA ABU SHAREKH, GAZA PROGRAM COORDINATOR, INARA: Yes, actually this confirmation on famine, as you've said, it's not surprising to us as not

only humanitarian aid workers, but also people who are living and experiencing this famine and the risk of famine for almost five months now.

So it's very -- but this declaration is very crucial and important for the international community and the advocates to take serious and immediate

actions to stop this conflict and to support the humanitarian organizations to do the work they're supposed to do.

If we allow to support people in the Gaza Strip, especially children and elderlies, and those vulnerable groups, this famine could not be reached at

this level. So the situation on the ground is catastrophic. And it's not only about food itself, it's about the system. The entire system that has

collapsed. Two days ago, I was walking by two children who fire cooking in the street beside their tent, beside literally, literally the garbage and

very close to sewage.

So what kind of food those children would eat that the -- the diarrhea disease is another issue among children who are malnourished and they don't

have any immunity to deal with any kind of disease. Even us as a humanitarian aid workers, we felt the starvation and the famine ourselves

on our bodies, on our children. Last month, I was barely stand and talk to the families and the team and the cases visited our clinic in Gaza City.

So the situation on the ground is unimaginable. But it's time to take action rather than providing statements and speaking up.

GIOKOS: So, Yousra -- Yousra, it's so heartbreaking hearing some of -- some of the stories and especially, you know, what you're telling me now

specifically in Gaza City. We also know that Israel plans to deploy another 60,000 reservists. A lot of people are now being displaced. What challenges

are you facing in Gaza City in terms of food and other supplies right now? Give me a sense of the reality and how people are preparing to leave.

ABU SHAREKH: Yes, people are using -- people already are internally displaced and they were using their tents for almost 20 months, for

example, and for five months a shelter item and other non-food items are not allowed to enter into Gaza Strip. So it's not about only the energy

that people don't have to move, but also the supplies. We, as a humanitarian organization, we don't have any pre-positioning.

The hospitals are out of stock when it comes to medicines and consumables for -- to deal with mass casualties and with injuries and other kind of

health issues on the ground.

[10:55:07]

So it's not easy and it's not easy as well to answer the questions. So people started to give up -- to give up asking questions like where to go.

They know very well now by experience that there is no single spot in the whole Gaza Strip that is safe. They know very well that there is no space

for them in the -- in the southern part of Gaza Strip, especially in Al- Mawasi and Khan Younis. So they don't want to experience something that they already did before.

And also the question what to eat. It's very hard for us, for example at INARA, when desperate mothers come to the center, we have, in Gaza City

crying and asking for only baby formula. So imagine for infant, the baby formula is not allowed to enter Gaza Strip. So it's insane.

GIOKOS: Yousra --

ABU SHAREKH: It's very hard to deal with all these conditions on the ground.

GIOKOS: Yes. Yousra, thank you so much. Unfortunately, we've run out of time. But thank you so much for your insights and for sharing those stories

with us. Much appreciated.

Well, thanks so much for joining us for CONNECT THE WORLD. You can stay with CNN. "ONE WORLD" is up next, and continuing coverage of our breaking

news.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

END