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CNN Live At Daybreak

President Bush to Announce Decision on Stem Cell Research Funding Tonight

Aired August 09, 2001 - 08:32   ET

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

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
COLLEEN MCEDWARDS, CNN ANCHOR: President Bush is to address the nation 9:00 p.m. Eastern to talk about his decision on embryonic stem cell research. This is tough issue. It's a pro-life issue. It's an ethical issue. But it's also a scientific issue, because a lot of scientists believe that disease could be cured, cures could be found by going further with kind of research.

We want to bring you up to date on the story with CNN's Major Garrett, who is at the White House right now.

Major, what do you know?

MAJOR GARRETT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning Colleen.

In addition to all the other things you said about this decision, it is an acutely political decision, the White House aware of all the various dimensions of this decision the president will make. You know, they have saying at the White House, "in the family," and that's how they say this decision had been made, in the family. Who is in the family? Well, of course, the president, the first lady, Laura Bush, and the president's two top advisers, Karen Hughes, the counselor of the president, and Karl Rove, senior political adviser to the president. Beyond that tight circle,those four, no one else at the White House who I've talked to this knows what the president is actually going to say tonight.

There's a good deal of anticipation here at the White House, and as this news spreads across the country, anticipation there as well as to what the president will actually say. But this has been a very tightly-held deliberation, a very tightly held decision, and only those four know what the president is going to say tonight. Of course members of Congress will be very interested in this decision. Many have already expressed their support for federal funding, sometimes limited, but nevertheless federal funding for embryonic stem cell research.

We talked to one of the proponents of embryonic stem cell research at the federal level, Health and Human Services chairman -- or Secretary Tommy Thompson on CNN this morning. He said, when the nations hears the president decision, tonight after he finishes ,they will be proud of the decision he makes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TOMMY THOMPSON, HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES SECRETARY: The president has been very concerned about all of the issues, rightly as he should. I was very proud of him, the way he has handled himself throughout the whole debate. The people listening to him tonight, and say, you know, this individual really spent a lot of time with this, and I understand what -- why he made this decision.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GARRETT: Now, let's talk about some of the people within the administration who have already stated their opinion and said so to the president. Tommy Thompson is one of them. He's in favor of federal funding. The vice president, Dick Cheney, I've been told, is also in favor of federal funding of embryonic stem cell research. The president's chief of staff, Andrew Card, also in private deliberations with the president has expressed his preference for funding of embryonic stem cell research. So a good number of the people inside the White House. Also senior officials tell me that many establishment Republicans the president has talked to about this issue have also pressed for a go-ahead of federal funding on embryonic stem cell research.

But Karl Rove, senior political adviser, is said to be troubled about it, troubled about the ethical and moral dimensions of a decision like this.

No one knows in the White House where Karen Hughes stands on this issue. There is a great anticipation on Capitol Hill, in the Senate and in the House, a wide expression of support for federal funding of stem cell research. But we'll all find out what the president decides later on tonight -- Colleen.

MCEDWARDS: Major Garrett, thanks. And of course a big issue for scientist, who -- some of them who believe whether or not federal funding is allowed, essentially decides whether or not this research is allowed to go ahead.

For more on the science of this issue, Vince has got more on that right now.

VINCE CELLINI, CNN ANCHOR: That's right, what's at stake in this particular issue?

Elizabeth Cohen, CNN's Elizabeth Cohen now has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): These four children, Savannah and Marshall, Tyler and Spencer, all began life in a petri dish, egg and sperm joined in the lab, the resulting embryos implanted into their mother's wombs. Tyler and Spencer are Pamela Madsen's only children.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE:: Left over from Spencer's cycle was four fertilized eggs, and they've been stored in a cryogenic tank at an IBF program for almost nine years now. COHEN: Twins Savannah and Marshall are Suzanne Gray's (ph) second and third children, younger sibling to Madeline, who was conceived without in vitro fertilization.

And suddenly, in the same instant that I realized I was pregnant with our fourth child, in the same exact instant, the thought went through my mind of, oh my goodness, what are we going to do with 23 embryos.

(on camera): Both mothers have the same dilemma, what to do with embryos left over from in vitro fertilization. And that's goes to the heart of the national debate over stem cells. The Grays and Madisons made very different choices, and it's the passion behind those choices that helps explain why this debate has become so contentious.

(voice-over): The Grays donated them to an infertile family who couldn't make their own embryos.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE:: I didn't want to be in heaven and have this spirit of the face of this child come up to me and said, mommy, why wasn't I important enough?

COHEN: But the Madisons didn't want to give their embryos up for adoption. Instead they've donated them to stem cell research researchers.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE:: Those embryos could help somebody else's baby walk. Those embryos could help some poor child suffering with diabetes.

COHEN: The embryos are a rich source for stem cells. So far, the testing is only in animals. But doctors predict in the years to come, stem cells will revolutionize medicine. The cells can be turned into different types of body tissue to create, they hope, treatment for diseases. But for the Grays, the embyros aren't materials for research; they're unborn babies.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE:: That is a very real picture for us, knowing that these embryos are the joining of a man and a woman.

COHEN: But Pamela Madison, while she supports embryo adoption, could not stand the thought of her own biological children being raised from someone else far away from her.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE:: I wasn't the kind of mother that could let go in that way, wondering about a baby out there in the world, maybe needing me in some way.

COHEN: Two women, two different choices. Now the decision about whether to spend federal dollars on embryonic stem cell research is up to President Bush, up to him to decide which woman is right, the one who says frozen embryos should only be used to make new babies, or the one who says they should only be used to help people who have already been born.

Elizabeth Cohen, CNN, Atlanta. (END VIDEOTAPE)

CELLINI: President Bush said he would announce this on his own timetable, and the time is nearly at hand.

President Bush will announce his decision on federal funding for stem cell research, and we'll carry that live announcement 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time from Texas right here on CNN.

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