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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson Announces His Resignation; United And FAA Spar Over Blame In Cancellations Wreaking Havoc; Brother Of Detained American Reacts To Biden Calling Griner Family. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired July 07, 2022 - 07:30   ET

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

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[07:31:28]

BORIS JOHNSON, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: Good afternoon. It -- thank you, thank you.

It is clearly now the will of the Parliamentary Conservative Party that there should be a new leader of that party and therefore, a new prime minister. And I have agreed with Sir Graham Brady, the chairman of our backbench MPs, that the process of choosing that new leader should begin now and the timetable will be announced next week. And I've -- today, I've appointed a cabinet to serve, as I will until a new leader is in place.

So I want to say to the millions of people who voted for us in 2019, many of them voting conservative for the first time, thank you for that incredible mandate -- the biggest conservative majority since 1987; the biggest share of the vote since 1979.

And the reason I have fought so hard in the last few days to continue to deliver that mandate in person was not just because I wanted to do so but because I felt it was my job, my duty, my obligation to you to continue to do what we promised in 2019.

And, of course, I'm immensely proud of the achievements of this government from getting Brexit done to settling our relations with the continent for over half a century, reclaiming the power for this country to make its own laws in Parliament. Getting us all through the pandemic, delivering the fastest vaccine rollout in Europe. The fastest exit from lockdown.

And in the last few months, leading the West in standing up to Putin's aggression in Ukraine. Let me say now to the people of Ukraine that I know that we in the U.K. will continue to back your fight for freedom for as long as it takes.

And at the same time, in this country, we've been pushing forward a vast program of investment in infrastructure and skills, and technology -- the biggest in a century. Because if I have one insight into human beings, it is the genius and talent, and enthusiasm, and imagination are evenly distributed throughout the population, but opportunity is not. And that's why we must keep leveling up. Keep unleashing the potential of every part of the United Kingdom. And if we can do that in this country we will be the most prosperous in Europe.

And in the last few days, I've tried to persuade my colleagues that it would be eccentric to change governments when we're delivering so much and when we have such as vast mandate, and when we're actually only a handful of points behind in the polls, even in midterm after quite a few months of pretty relentless sledging and when the economic scene is so difficult domestically and internationally.

And I regret not to have been successful in those arguments and, of course, it's painful not to be able to see through so many ideas and projects myself.

But as we've seen at Westminster, the herd instinct is powerful. When the herd moves, it moves. And my friends, in politics, no one is remotely indispensable.

And our brilliant and Darwinian system will produce another leader equally committed to taking this country forward through tough times, not just helping families to get through it but changing and improving we do things. Cutting burdens on businesses and families and yes, cutting taxes because that is the way to generate the growth and the income we need to pay for great public services.

[07:35:17]

And to that new leader, I say -- whoever he or she may be, I say I will give you as much support as I can. And to you, the British public, I know that there will be many people who are relieved and perhaps quite a few who will also be disappointed. And I want you to know how sad I am to be giving up the best job in the world, but them's the breaks.

I want to thank Carrie and our children, and all the members of my family who have had to put up with so much for so long. I want to thank the fearless British Civil Service for the help and support that you have given our police, our emergency services. And, of course, our fantastic NHS who at a critical moment helped to extend my own period in office, as well as our armed services and our agencies that are so admired around the world.

And our indefectible Conservative Party members and supporters whose selfless campaigning makes our democracy possible.

I want to thank the wonderful staff here at Chequers -- here at number 10 and, of course, at Chequers, and our fantastic Prop Force detectives -- the one group, by the way, who never leave.

Above all, I want to thank you, the British public, for the immense privilege that you have given me. And I want you to know that from now until the new prime minister is in place, your interests will be served and the government of the country will be carried on.

Being prime minister is an education in itself. I've traveled to every part of the United Kingdom and in addition to the beauty of our natural world, I've found so many people possessed of such boundless British originality and so willing to tackle old problems in new ways. That I know that even if things can sometimes seem dark now, our future together is golden.

Thank you all very much. Thank you.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Boris Johnson announcing he is resigning as prime minister. A defiant Boris Johnson announces he is resigning as prime minister, bragging about his accomplishment in more than two years in office. Bragging, still, about the electoral mandate he thought he won nearly three years ago. And most importantly, or very importantly, not giving a timetable for when he will actually leave office, saying that the timetable will be announced one week from now.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, interesting.

He also appealed to the Ukrainian people. But I wonder what did the British people think, right? Obviously, he's very popular in Ukraine and he took credit there, saying leading the West when it comes to Ukraine.

But I do want to get now to Christiane Amanpour to see what she thought of what Boris Johnson said -- Christiane.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Well, you both picked up on the key lines there, and that is a big wow. There was absolutely no sense that he had any understanding that he could read the room or himself about why this has happened. He said them's are the breaks as if it was an act of God, other than it was actually his actions, according to his own party, that led him to this self- inflicted wound that has finally led to him having to resign.

He simply did not apologize. He didn't talk to the British people who we have seen plummet in the popularity. In the last week, we have seen the number of British adults who want him to resign rise to seven in 10. That is a huge number of British adults who wanted him to resign.

At no point did he acknowledge all the things that have happened over the last two years that have led him to this point of personal destruction. This is not about policy, remember. This is entirely about a lack of integrity as it has been viewed, a lack of honesty as it has been viewed. A stampede of his own cabinet and ministers from under his wing. And, indeed, plunging popularity and the inability to win certain important local elections.

He at no point acknowledged that.

And as you say -- and as you say, he did not answer the $64,000 question, which is when does he leave?

He implied that it's in his writ to appoint a new cabinet. Who? Who is that going to be? They've all resigned. Which numbers of people are going to want to work? Maybe he's already got that sorted out.

[07:40:07]

And how long can he stay?

And another open question is will this famous committee that deals with confidence votes and a certain amount of process in the Tory Party -- the so-called 1922 Committee -- will it actually have its election as it said it would do on Monday, change the rules and allow for yet another vote of no confidence, and then boot him out? Presumably not, but if he continues to stay in until several months, maybe they will have to figure out a way -- a way around that. Because most analysts have said and most politicians have said this morning that he cannot stay in as a credible caretaker prime minister.

So those are still open questions, John and Brianna.

BERMAN: I want to bring in Nic Robertson who is at 10 Downing Street. Nic, Boris Johnson says he will announce a timetable next week -- even in resigning, trying to buy more time, it seems, for some of the backroom politicking that has gone on.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Absolutely vintage Boris Johnson. This is precisely how he rolls. He does not want to leave the job. He spoke about it there -- this is the best job in the world.

He has been trying to find ways to hold on and hold on for as long as possible. He's obviously realized this morning, very belatedly, that the party no longer wants him. He had originally suggested that he would hold on until the fall -- until the Conservative Party conference. And he still seems to be kind of heading toward some sort of bargain where he might last out a bit longer.

It was very striking standing here watching not only party officials and government workers come out of their office, but one of the last to join them was Carrie Johnson, Boris Johnson's wife, with their latest baby. She came to watch.

I remember standing here when he made his acceptance speech coming into Downing Street, the 24th of July three years ago now. He -- at that time, she came out on the street to watch him, very proudly looking on. And there was a big cheer -- a big cheer and a big round of applause from her and those workers around her -- those government workers around her when Boris Johnson came out. A sort of rousing cheer.

That was at that end of the street. At the other end of the street where the public are, it was boos and they were vying -- both vying to drown out, almost, the prime minister.

A lot of people outside of Downing Street here. Obviously, they have a vested interest in coming down and trying to shout down the prime minister, and that's the nature of politics in this country. But it was very striking that on the one hand, you had the small group supporting the prime minister; others trying to shout him down.

And rather a metaphor for the cracked and chaotic nature of Boris Johnson's final weeks in office. The speaker system here next to me just did not work. It was -- delivered a crackling, low-level version of what the prime minister was saying. Even leaving office, as unclear as his speech was from his lips, the mechanism to deliver it wasn't up to the job. And that's been a metaphor for Boris Johnson and his cabinet and, indeed, the way that the country is increasingly perceived as a less reliable, traditional partner.

KEILAR: Yes, a very interesting view there from the ground in that, in particular.

Christiane, he's talking in this speech there about a mandate. That's the reason why he's going to keep fighting. He's going to keep staying in the interim. Does he have a mandate?

AMANPOUR: Well, the short answer is no, Brianna, because he might have done -- and this has been his and Downing Street's defense over the last crisis -- weeks and days -- particularly, the last few days -- that they have said listen, 14 million people voted for us in 2019. This is a historic majority we've achieved in Parliament. We've even bust into the opposition Labour Party heartland and stronghold in the north. And we have done something extraordinary.

That was true -- that was true three years ago and it's not true now. Because that mandate that he talks about belies his -- the facts.

The fact is that in the United Kingdom there is a parliamentary system. This revolves around the party. It is the party that people vote for, not the person. The person who is the head of the party then becomes prime minister. But it is the party that's on the ballot paper in each and every election.

And then furthermore, his mandate, so to speak, has been whittled away in terms of popularity polls. As I said, his popularity has been plunging like a rock over the last days and weeks, and months. He does not have that mandate that he claims from the people. Seven in 10 British adults want him to resign. That's up 10 points from just last week when it was six in 10.

[07:45:07]

In that interim, his party has lost very key local elections. So in no way does he have a mandate. Not to mention, his -- practically his entire cabinet stampeding out -- so many dozens of ministers and cabinet secretaries. So he does not have a mandate from them either.

He doesn't have a mandate from his party either because they want to, frankly, change the rules and to call another confidence vote. They wanted to do that before he announced that he would resign.

And I will also say that for somebody who has delivered great speeches in the past, this was not a great speech. Clearly, he had not prepared anything. He only had between the time that he told the BBC and his people at 8:30 this morning that he was going to resign and before he walked out to actually write something. It was a very subpar speech. It was not historic. It was not Churchillian, as he likes to compare himself to Churchill.

And here is an ironic fact. That Churchill's great nemesis, of course, was Neville Chamberlain, famously booted out for appeasing the Nazis -- though two of them have had exactly the same time in office.

And yes, he has been very vocal and front and center in supporting Ukraine, but that is a British government policy and it will remain a British government policy. It does not demand -- or rather, depend on the person of Boris Johnson. So that also is neither here nor there.

And then, you know, we heard a historian say today, just to put it in further context, that in the 300 years of British -- you know, centuries of parliamentary history with 55 prime ministers, this is the first one to have gone down in such spectacular personal flames. Not about to issue a policy.

And there was no emotion, guys.

BERMAN: Yes.

AMANPOUR: Even Theresa May shed a tear. Margaret Thatcher shed a tear. And even David Cameron was quite emotional. Not Boris Johnson.

BERMAN: No. The memorable lines from the speech were "When the herd moves, the herd moves." And then he said, "but them's the breaks." That is what Boris Johnson says as he is resigning from the office -- one, of course, still remains to be seen.

You talked about the historical nature of this. Let's bring in Kate Williams, royal historian. She joins us now.

Kate, unprecedented to say the least. A mass exodus from within his own government. Sixty officials fleeing over the last 48 hours. Put this in perspective.

KATE WILLIAMS, CNN ROYAL HISTORIAN: It is unprecedented. We've had an unprecedented level of chaos.

As you say, first, we lost our chancellor and our health minister, then everyone else followed. And we ended up with, this morning, 60 people had resigned, and seven people resigned before breakfast.

It was, as Boris Johnson calls it, a herd. Really, I call it a flood. It was a flood of resignations. And the opposition -- the Labour Party was saying that if Boris Johnson wasn't forced out, they'd force him out.

Really, this has been a lesson I think in Johnson refusing to see what was in front of his face. That he'd lost the confidence of the party, of Parliament, and he's lost the confidence of the public. There have been a series of scandals -- sex scandals. Partygate scandals in which people were partying in his office and he was there, too, during lockdown when everyone else was under severe lockdown rules.

He really has lost complete confidence but he couldn't see it. And in his mind, he still is this great statesman. Christiane was talking so brilliantly there about how his speech -- his speech wasn't statesmanlike. That's how he wants to see himself but at the moment, he's not a statesman.

He really -- this is going up in flames. This has really been complete chaos.

And not only is the fact that what's happened but also, as you were saying, what is to happen. We don't have a schedule. We don't know when he's actually going to resign. He wanted to hang on until the fall but he's now talking of hanging on for a week or so. So, really, there's still no certainty.

And this is going to affect the markets. The pound has really gone up. The FTSE market has gone up. But it's going to crash, I think, once more if we don't have some certainty about who is in charge here.

KEILAR: Yes. Look, we can't forget there is also a scandal where he embarrassed the queen. He had to apologize to her.

Kate, what is her role in this right now, moving forward?

WILLIAMS: Yes. So we have no written constitution so we have no precedent on who is caretaker. We'd expect it to be the deputy prime minister but we don't -- there's no precedent.

This is the same for the queen as well, though. There was no specific precedent. There's no specific -- you might think that the queen might be able to come in and say we're going to sort this out -- let's have a prime minister -- but she can't. She can only call someone to form a government when that decision has always been made.

So we understand they had their usual conversation on Wednesday evening -- the queen and Boris Johnson. But really, she has to kind of stand by a little bit like -- well, the rest of us, really, watching while this happens.

I'm sure that she has a lot of opinions but she has to wait until there's a clear mandate -- a clear decision about who is the next prime minister. And then she will call the prime minister to her to formally form a government. But until then, she's really almost as helpless as the rest of us.

BERMAN: Yes, clear as mud right now. Nothing is clear --

WILLIAMS: Yes, clear as mud.

BERMAN: -- in London right now. Boris Johnson put a timetable as a week for another announcement.

[07:50:02]

Kate, thank you. Nic Robertson --

WILLIAMS: Thank you.

BERMAN: -- please, again, stand by because these developments are coming fast and furious.

You know, questions here in the United States -- who is on the other end of the line for the next few weeks? What is on the other end of the line in terms of this key British ally? More breaking news from the international scene this morning. Word that the Russians have bombed Snake Island in the Black Sea as the Ukrainians raise a flag there. We're going to go live to Ukraine for that.

KEILAR: Plus, right now, WNBA star Brittney Griner is facing another hearing in Moscow. This, as the family of another detained American, Paul Whelan, shared their frustration with the president.

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BERMAN: A major fight brewing between United Airlines and the Federal Aviation Administration. United is blaming the FAA's air traffic control system for the recent flight delays and cancellations. But the FAA is defending itself, saying there are multiple reasons for the recent travel disruptions.

[07:55:10]

CNN's Pete Muntean live at Reagan National Airport where it's the passengers, Pete, caught in the middle of this.

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: It's so true, John. You know, this is a big showdown over who is really to blame for these massive flight cancellations -- 2,200 nationwide in the five days leading up to July Fourth, according to FlightAware.

United Airlines says, though, that the federal government is partly to blame for all of this because of staffing issues at FAA air traffic control centers. Though it's important to remember that airlines got a lot smaller over the pandemic.

Here is what United says in a new statement. It says, "The reality is that there are just more flights scheduled industrywide than the air traffic control system can handle, particularly in New York and Florida. Until that is resolved, we expect the U.S. aviation system will remain challenged this summer and beyond," according to United Airlines.

Now, last night, the FAA fired back in a new statement, saying "On July third and fourth there were no FAA staffing-related delays at all, yet airlines canceled 1,100 flights," the FAA says, a quarter of which were at United Airlines.

This back-and-forth has been going on for a few weeks now. I want you to listen now to Transportation Sec. Pete Buttigieg about who is really to blame for all of this. And he says some of the blame is really on the airlines, not so much on the federal government.

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PETE BUTTIGIEG, U.S. TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY: So we've seen a number of different overlapping issues. Some of it has to do with staffing. A lot of pilots were invited to take early retirement. Air crews weren't brought back at the level that we need.

When you look at our air traffic control system, for example, that is not explaining the majority of cancellations and delays.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MUNTEAN: This is not over. Airline experts say we will see a summer of misery when it comes to flight cancellations.

As for thinning out all of this bad blood, that will be on the Biden administration's new nominee to lead the FAA, Phil Washington, who runs the Denver airport. A big job ahead of him, John.

BERMAN: A big job, indeed. Again, what passengers want -- they want their planes to leave on time.

MUNTEAN: Yes, true.

BERMAN: Pete Muntean at Reagan National Airport, thank you so much.

KEILAR: Right now, WNBA star Brittney Griner is back in a Russian courtroom for another hearing. She's been detained in a Moscow jail since February after being accused of drug smuggling.

Yesterday, CNN learned President Biden and Vice President Harris spoke to Griner's wife by phone. But other relatives of detained Americans, like my next guest, are expressing frustration that the president's personal attention isn't consistent as they see it.

Joining us now is David Whelan. His brother, Paul, has been detained in Russia since 2018. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison in a trial that U.S. officials denounced as unfair.

Thank you so much for being with us.

First of all, can you just tell us how your brother is doing?

DAVID WHELAN, BROTHER PAUL WHELAN IMPRISONED IN RUSSIA (via Skype): Well, it's summer in Mordovia, so it's hot. The sanctions have now caused the textiles and buttons and things that they send to the labor camp to slow down, so there's not very much work. It's a pretty awful existence.

KEILAR: What's your -- what's your worry right now when it comes to the Biden administration and its efforts to get your brother out?

WHELAN: Well, we're on our second presidential administration, so 3 1/2 years in, and we really still haven't seen any forward movement to get Paul released. We haven't seen the U.S. government create a framework or an environment in which they will preempt these sort of wrongful detentions going forward. So, we sort of feel like we're not going anywhere.

KEILAR: Does this call on behalf of Brittney Griner with the president -- does that worry you? Does that raise concerns for you?

WHELAN: No. I was thrilled that President Biden and Vice President Harris took the time to speak with Ms. Griner. I don't think that there is anything more valuable to the family of wrongful detainees than to hear from the government.

And I think that the frustration, to the extent that it is out there, is directed towards the inconsistency of how the U.S. government interacts with wrongfully detainee families -- how they communicate with us, and how they give us updates or let us know what the reality is of what is and what isn't possible.

So, day-to-day, month-to-month, as the years go by as we -- as we sort of look out towards 16 years for Paul, it would be useful to understand exactly what we need to do when we get messages from the State Department that we need to make more noise. Our family needs to make more noise and get in the media and so on in order to raise Paul's -- awareness around Paul's case. We need to know that that's actually having an impact.

So, things like presidential calls can be meaningful to some families.

KEILAR: Your sister is upset. Can you -- can you explain that? I mean, what is the -- is the concern here that relative to, say, Brittney Griner, that he's being forgotten? Is that her worry? Is that your worry?

WHELAN: Oh, no -- not at all.

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