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New Day

Democratic Establishment Candidate Prevails in Ohio; Delta Outbreak Hits Wuhan; Alexander Vindman is Interviewed about Trump and Ukraine. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired August 04, 2021 - 06:30   ET

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

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[06:31:42]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: A big victory overnight for the Biden wing of the Democratic Party. Moderate Shontel Brown defeating the progressive candidate Nina Turner, in a special primary election in Ohio's 11th Congressional District.

CNN's Jeff Zeleny is with us now.

I know that you've been tracking this race there in Ohio. How big of a deal is this for the Democratic establishment?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Brianna, it's a very big deal because the Democratic establishment was all-in on this race. So it was pretty -- you know, a sleepy special election happening this summer. Very low turnout. But in the last several weeks, the establishment, the full weight of the party, has been behind Shontel Brown. She's a member of the county council there, the local Democratic chair. And she was campaigning on helping President Biden's agenda.

The White House stayed out of this race but the president was front and center in this. Who is going to be sent to help and be an ally not an antagonist? That's where Nina Turner comes in. of course, she would have been a member of "the squad." Through she way saying, look, I'll help the president when needed, but I need to push him in a progressive way.

She had a ton of help from the outside, too. Bernie Sanders as well. So this is one of the latest examples of how the moderate wing of the party, the establishment wing of the party, the president's wing of the party really is, you know, being victorious in these elections.

But listen last night to Nina Turner as she conceded. It's hardly gracious.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NINA TURNER (D), FORMER OHIO CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE DEFEATED IN PRIMARY: See, we didn't lose this race. Evil money manipulated and maligned in this election. It took evil money to come in here and do this. But I swear to you

that as sure as there is a god in heaven, Sister Turner going to continue working with every fiber of her being until true justice reigns.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZELENY: So talking a lot about the money in the race. Actually, Nina Turner raised much more money than Shontel Brown, but the outside money from outside groups overwhelmed her candidacy.

At issue was a comment she said last year about Joe Biden. A disparaging four letter comment comparing him to the former president. We know she didn't vote for Hillary Clinton.

So, Brianna, what this reminded me of, I actually thought of you, we covered the 2016 race, the divisions from the Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton primary campaign are still alive and well. That's what this race was also about.

KEILAR: They certainly are. And we were looking, too, at the Republican side of things because after Trump's pick in the Texas special election recently did not succeed, observers were wondering, well, what's going to happen in Ohio? So what has happened?

ZELENY: Right. This was in Ohio's 15th congressional district around Columbus and a bit south of there. A safe Republican district. The president -- the former president's backed a candidate, Mike Carey. He won last night, defeated a wide field of candidates. There were 11 candidates running. He narrowly defeat three other establishment- backed candidates and pretty well-known names. He's a coal lobbyist. He's never run for office before. But the former president put his hands on him, blessed him, endorsed him and he won the race.

It's significant only because if he had lost, of course, we would say President Trump is losing power. He still has considerable power in the base.

So this is a safe Republican seat. It's to fill the seat from a former congressman, Steve Stivers, who resigned to lead the Ohio Chamber of Commerce. So both of these seats are safe in either hands.

But, no question, the former president put out a statement moments after the polls closed, after this was declared. Of course he was declaring a huge victory. So, interesting night in Ohio.

[06:35:01]

KEILAR: Yes, so much attention on these special elections. It's fascinating.

ZELENY: Yes.

KEILAR: Jeff Zeleny, thank you so much and for the 2016 flashback.

ZELENY: Always good, right? KEILAR: Always good and bad. Good and bad.

Former President Obama canceling his 60th birthday party as coronavirus cases spike. We'll have the breaking details coming up.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Plus, China grappling with its biggest outbreak in months. The extreme measures now being taken in the original epicenter of the pandemic.

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BERMAN: Developing this morning, China grappling with the worst coronavirus outbreak there in months. The delta variant has now reached the original epicenter of the pandemic in Wuhan, prompting authorities to begin testing all 11 million residents from that city.

CNN's David Culver has the story.

[06:40:01]

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DAVID CULVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Chinese state media calling it the worst outbreak since Wuhan. Officials mobilizing across China to stop the rapid spread, linked in part to the delta variant. A handful of confirmed COVID-19 cases surfacing from Shanghai to Beijing. Worrisome given China's zero cases focus.

CULVER (on camera): Here in the capital city you have tens of thousands of residents under strict lockdown. This is one of those communities. The reason we're not getting out is to not expose ourselves to what is a locked down neighborhood.

Behind these barriers you have folks who are abiding by the stay-at- home orders and who are once again having to undergo mass testing. The warning from officials, it's eerily reminiscent of 2020.

CULVER (voice over): A Beijing government spokesperson vowing to block the virus from spreading further within Beijing at any cost. It's leading to a halting of travel in China's capital from affected areas. The list of which is quickly growing.

Among the cities with new outbreaks, Wuhan. After roughly a year of enjoying life near normal, the original epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak is now testing each of its more than 11 million residents. Families canceling summer travel plans, opting instead to stay home.

Several communities sealed off. Thousands taken into government quarantine for observation. The lockdowns, the mass testing, strict contact tracing through smartphones all being enforced once again.

CULVER (on camera): It might all sound extreme, but China's domestic containment efforts, along with its tight border restrictions, seem to have been working. Aside from a few isolated cluster outbreaks, life here had mainly returned to the way it was pre-COVID. CULVER (voice over): But officials say a commercial flight from Russia

changed that. The plane landing in the eastern city of Nanjing on July 10th, suspected of carrying the highly contagious delta variant. On July 20th, officials confirmed Nanjing airport workers subsequently tested positive. Two days later, thousands of tourists visiting the central Chinese city of Zhangjiajie crowded together to watch live shows. It's believed some of those attending had been infected traveling through Nanjing. Cases then surfaced in several major cities and have since spread to dozens of others.

As of Tuesday, the virus has been detected in 16 provinces across China. It is the greatest test yet of China's post-outbreak containment efforts and puts into question the effectiveness of Chinese-made vaccines against variants like delta.

While the official number of confirmed cases is still in the hundreds since July 20th, all of the airport staff in places like Nanjing were reported to have been fully vaccinated with Chinese vaccines. Still, many got infected. Even more concerning, several of those sickened are reported to be in severe condition.

It has sparked uncertainty and panic buying in some cities. Grocery store shelves quickly emptying as folks prepare for this latest outbreak to worsen and new stay-at-home orders to take effect. This latest outbreak coinciding with the countdown to the 2022 Winter Olympics. Beijing gearing up to host the world, the games scheduled to start in six months. The spectator infrastructure is in place, but this new variant threatening to leave stands near empty for yet another pandemic Olympics.

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CULVER: Perhaps one of the biggest indicators of how serious folks are taking this latest outbreak, John, you walk outside, you notice there have been no policy changes but everyone's putting masks back on. They do that rather quickly. It's a sign of the social acceptance and attitude and really, I think, the distrust and fear of what could come.

This one is jarring. I'll admit, it's strange to be back in these strict measures that we're starting to feel, especially inside this bubble that is China. Life was getting back to normal. You started to sense that.

And the timing could not be worse. As we pointed out, it is six months to the day that this country is supposed to host the world for the Olympic Games.

BERMAN: You know, and they can see the difficulty they've had in Tokyo.

David Culver, listen, you have covered every aspect of this for us in China from the very beginning. It's terrific to have your insight. Thank you for the work you continue to do.

CULVER: Thanks, John. BERMAN: The new vaccine requirement at businesses in New York City. You know, we heard from Equinox yesterday. They thought this was essential for business. So how will customers react?

KEILAR: Plus, he was a key witness in President Trump's first impeachment trial. What he's now saying about the phone call that changed his life.

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[06:48:20]

KEILAR: In November, 2019, Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman testified before the House Intelligence Committee about what he heard then President Donald Trump offer Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. That testimony catapulted him into the public eye, ultimately led to President Trump firing him from his job on the National Security Council. And in his new book "Here, Right Matters: An American Story," Vindman details his side of the story and what happened after his testimony.

Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, who has since retired from the Army, is with us now.

Alex, thank you so much for being with us today.

And, you know, in your book you, of course, detailed this phone conversation -- this is the thing that changed your life -- and led to President Trump's impeachment where he was setting up this quid pro quo with Ukraine's president, investigate Biden, get the aid. You write of Trump, monotone, standoffish, he remains stubborn aloof to Zelesky's efforts to make a personal connection. I already knew one thing, my carefully prepared talking points had gone by the boards. The president wasn't using them at all. He may never have seen them. As the conversation progressed, my worst fears about the call kept being reconfirmed. Off on a tangent of his own, the president, with every passing moment, was aggravating a potentially explosive foreign policy situation.

You're essentially listening and probably freaking out as you hear what he's doing. What was it like?

LT. COL. ALEXANDER VINDMAN (RET.), FORMER EUROPEAN AFFAIRS DIRECTOR, NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL: You know, a military freak is -- might be different than, you know --

KEILAR: A quiet scream? I don't know.

VINDMAN: Maybe. Maybe. I certainly was starting to think through what steps I would have to take to do some damage control, which was not an uncommon issue with the Trump administration.

[06:50:03]

Whether it was by tweet and you're sitting and knowing that you need to respond to inquiries like I did on my first day in (INAUDIBLE), which was Helsinki and press inquiries, congressional inquiries, what is going on? That's the kind of drill I was going through. It's kind of almost like a battle drill that you see in the military react to some sort of contact and the president being the adversary in this case based on just completely going off the rails.

KEILAR: Thinking of the president as an adversary, that's something. I mean you consulted with your brother, who was also on the National Security Council, Eugene. You describe a situation where you told him that if this were to be public, it's something the president would be impeached for.

Was that going through your mind at the moment you were there listening to the call?

VINDMAN: Sure. So, I mean, an adversary in the sense that he's an adversary to good governance.

KEILAR: Yes. That's -- yes.

VINDMAN: He's a corrupt actor.

When I -- when I went in and saw Eugene, which was -- you know, that was my respite. He's my twin brother. I can -- I went to see -- saw him on a daily basis. We'd kind of chat about what was going on.

I was dead pan. I walked into his office and I was pretty -- and in about the most serious way I could, I conveyed to him that if I -- if -- what -- how -- if what I heard -- had heard was ever to become public, the president would be impeached. And he understood. He immediately caught the gravity of the situation. Not just because of what was communicated, but, you know, what this meant for a corrupt president seeking to undermine the very fabric of our democratic process, which is free and fair elections.

So -- and then history unfolded from there on.

KEILAR: You looking here at the last two years, of course, you testified. The president was impeached. He was acquitted. He goes on to promote the big lie, January 6th, based on the big lie happens. Do you think that that acquittal emboldened him to proceed as he did?

VINDMAN: I do. I think he's an individual that tests -- that automatically tests boundaries and pushes as far as he can go. And the signals he received from his acquittal emboldened him going into management of the pandemic. And I've said it before, the president was -- believed he could act with impunity. He believed he could disregard all of the warning signs about an unfolding pandemic. And his mismanagement resulted in needless deaths of hundreds of thousands of people.

Certainly we could still have people dying because of the pandemic, but it was the president's mismanagement. If he had been removed, if he had been censured, if he was on his back heels, we would not have had those kinds of casualties and we wouldn't have had a second impeachment and we wouldn't have had riots in the streets that the president himself inflamed. We wouldn't have had an insurrection. And that's not just the failure of the president, that's a failure of

the people that enabled the president.

KEILAR: I was speaking with someone recently who has experience with the regimes that you have experience with, right, in your area of expertise with eastern Europe and with Russia, authoritarian governments. And that person said that, you know, most Americans haven't seen those up close. So they don't necessarily recognize the hallmarks of them in the Trump administration or they aren't alarmed by them. But that Americans don't see a slide toward it when it's happening.

Do you think that there is a slide toward authoritarianism happening in the U.S.?

VINDMAN: Well, without any doubt I can say that a second Trump term would have put us on that trajectory. Clearly on that trajectory. And absent accountability for the misdeeds of the last administration, so that's the onus on the Biden administration to pursue accountability, we could be in the same weakened position moving forward into a different administration in the future, one that we might not be able to cope with.

If Trump was ham-handed and ineffective, the next wannabe tyrant, the next wannabe authoritarian can be a lot more effective in undermine -- further undermining the good governance and -- but it was -- we could be -- we could find ourselves in a completely different country. Unfortunately, a kind of country that had a lot of experience operating in and trying to help this country manage. That includes Russia.

KEILAR: Finally, before I let you go, your future, obviously, has taken a very different course than you expected, but I wonder what it holds for you. Are you -- would you consider running for office?

VINDMAN: You know, it's a -- it's a question that I get asked periodically. I think the key issue for me will ultimately be whether I think I could do some good. And the book that I wrote is about all those building blocks within my background that allowed me to navigate an unprecedented challenge in which an Army officer is put face to face with the president of the United States and the president is the one that's undermining national security.

[06:55:01]

Those are tools that I think I could apply in a lot of different ways, either to advance national security, to advocate for public service, to advocate for good governance. And while I'm reluctant to do -- to be in this space, no lieutenant colonel wishes to be in the limelight and the public eye. There's might come a day where I think I could do some good and, I don't know, I'm not discounting that possibility. Rachel, on the other hand, I don't know.

KEILAR: Your wife.

VINDMAN: My wife, Rachel, and (INAUDIBLE), I'm not sure if she's -- she's ready for that. So she'll probably be the decision maker on that point.

KEILAR: All right, you've talked her into, you know, an interesting life through the Army. We'll see if maybe that pans out as well.

Alexander Vindman, thanks for being with us.

VINDMAN: Thank you.

KEILAR: Another bomb blast in Afghanistan overnight as the Taliban advances. CNN's Clarissa Ward is live on the ground in Kabul.

BERMAN: Plus, an unruly passenger taped to his seat after allegedly groping and assaulting flight attendants. It's stunning video. But why is the airplane's crew been put on leave?

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BERMAN: This morning, the Taliban is taking responsibility for last night's car bombing near the home of Afghanistan's acting defense minister. The attack took place just hours after the Afghan army urged residents in another city to evacuate ahead of an operation against the Taliban.

This morning, the fighting is intensifying between the Taliban and Afghan forces, but the Taliban making gains in the southern part of the country.

Clarissa Ward live in Kabul for us this morning.

Clarissa, what do we know about the attack on the defense minister's home?

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: So we were actually not that far away from it and it was a massive explosion that literally shook the capital. We ran up to the roof to see what had happened. We could hear gunfire. There was an air raid siren that was wailing. That was followed by another two explosions.

It appears to have been some kind of complex attack. As you said, targeting the acting defense minister. He reportedly was not actually at home and so was not, in fact, injured. But eight civilians were killed in that attack. And it's fair to say that any illusions of security have also been firmly smashed.

There has been distinctive fighting throughout the country. The Taliban making huge territorial gains since the U.S. began its withdrawal of U.S. troops back in May.

[07:00:01]

But there have been relative calm here in Kabul. That is now over. There was another explosion this morning, John. Nobody killed in that.