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New Day

Voters are Not Feeling Good about the Economy; Putin's Martial Law Declaration; Headlines from Around the World; Record Highs and Lows Across the U.S.; Racial Disparities in Heart Failure Treatment Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired October 20, 2022 - 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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[06:32:48]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: The rustbelt city of Lordstown, Ohio, is making a comeback after some very tough years. But the rising cost of living is undermining the gains and worrying voters. So, how will inflation affect the midterms as Americans are heading to the polls.

CNN's Vanessa Yurkevich reports.

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VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Lordstown, Ohio. Once considered a mecca of manufacturing. Propped up by a behemoth, General Motors, and the 10,000 jobs it brought.

MAYOR ARNO HILL (R), LORDSTOWN: We did have a -- I'd have to say, the monster in the backyard, which was General Motors.

YURKEVICH: But in 2019, that monster left town.

YURKEVICH (on camera): When the last Chevy Cruise --

HILL: Came off the line.

YURKEVICH: Came off the lot, what is your memory of that - of that day and that time?

HILL: It was a very somber day.

YURKEVICH (voice over): Lordstown lost millions of dollars in revenue.

EARL ROSS, OWNER, ROSS' EATERY AND PUB: It's just light switch off.

YURKEVICH: Earl Ross owns Ross' Eatery and Pub. Ninety percent of his clientele were GM workers. With them gone, he didn't know if he'd survive.

But in the last two years, Lordstown, in Ohio's Mahoning Valley, started blooming with thousands of jobs again, with companies like Fox Con in the old GM plant and Ultium Cells producing electric batteries and vehicles, and a TJ Maxx home good distribution center.

P.J. SIRIANNI, PLANT MANAGER, M&M INDUSTRIES INC.: This place was available. And they purchased. And here we are.

YURKEVICH: This was once a plant that built seats for GM. Now it's M&M Industries, a plastic manufacturer that opened a year ago.

YURKEVICH (on camera): How many jobs do you have now? And where is the runway going?

SIRIANNI: So, currently we're at 60 with 11 machines. Our goal is 16 machines and 110 employees.

YURKEVICH: And where are these employees coming from?

SIRIANNI: All local.

YURKEVICH (voice over): But despite the local economy on the rebound with new jobs and rising wages, Ohioans in this area don't feel the same about the overall economy.

YURKEVICH (on camera): How would you describe the state of the economy right now?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So, I would say it's bad. You know, gas prices are through the roof. Cost of living is ridiculous.

[06:35:01]

DANIELLE WATSON, UNDECIDED VOTER: I think it's horrible. Inflation is the number one thing in our house. It costs a lot to money to feed fourteen teenagers.

YURKEVICH (voice over): And roughly nine in ten voters in the U.S. say the economy and inflation, still running hot at 8.2 percent, are extremely or very important to their vote in this year's midterm elections.

REP. TIM RYAN (D-OH): My turn, pal. My turn.

YURKEVICH: It could swing undecided voters in the close Ohio Senate race between Democrat Tim Ryan and Republican JD Vance.

YURKEVICH (on camera): What do you want to hear from either of them that will help inform your vote?

WATSON: Not as much bashing each other. How are you going to combat inflation?

YURKEVICH (voice over): For Ross it comes down to which candidates' policies will bring Lordstown, and the Mahoning Valley, back to its glory days, but with a new name.

ROSS: I just see so many leaders on both sides coming together to try to make voltage valley a real thing.

YURKEVICH (on camera): Do you think it's because they want to take credit for it?

ROSS: That's not for me to say. As long as the result is helping me, my family, and the local economy, I'm stoked.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

YURKEVICH: And business owners like Earl tell us that they've never seen sales so high, but also have never seen profits so low. And that's because inflation is taking such a big bite out of their bottom line.

And, Brianna, Ohio has been a swing state for decades, voting twice for Obama and then twice for Trump. But Mahoning County, where Lordstown is, has been reliably blue for 50 years, except when it flipped for Trump in 2020. So, voters telling us it's really anyone's race in these midterm elections. But one thing is for sure, Brianna, they do feel like they are going to be voting with their wallets.

Brianna.

KEILAR: Yes, certainly. Thank you so much for that, Vanessa Yurkevich.

Martial law going into effect in illegally annexed parts of Ukraine this morning. We have Colonel Cedric Leighton here to break down what that means, next.

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[06:41:03]

KEILAR: More air strikes reported in Ukraine overnight. A rocket hitting a children's school in a village in Zaporizhzhia. No word on injuries there. And officials in the Kribiri (ph) region say there's, quote, serious destruction from a hit on a power facility and an industrial area. This as martial law goes into effect in four Ukrainian regions illegally annexed by Russia.

Joining us now, we have CNN military analyst and former member of the Joint Staff at the Pentagon, retired Colonel Cedric Leighton.

Cedric, talk to us a little bit about these four regions. What does martial law means for them and for the civilians that live there?

COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yes, good morning, Brianna.

So, the four regions that we're talking about here are Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk, an Luhansk. These are the areas that the Russians have occupied since the start of this latest phase of the war.

So, what does martial law actually mean for the people there? Well, it's basically a substitution of military authority for civilian rule and it means that all existing laws, civil authority and administration of justice in the ordinary way is suspended. The military commander has unlimited authority to make and enforce laws. So that means that they can actually control these things in these areas.

Now, Ukraine has also declared martial law in the past. In fact, in November of 2018, the Ukrainian lawmakers had to - had enacted this when the Russians seized Ukrainian navy ships. And, of course, in February, when Ukraine was invaded, President Zelenskyy introduced martial law after the invasion was announced.

KEILAR: And what does Putin's declaration reveal to you about what Russia is attempting here?

LEIGHTON: So, in this particular case, what (INAUDIBLE) trying to control this area. So, we have to keep in mind what's going on, on the battlefield itself. This is Kherson, right here. This city is where the Ukrainians are moving around this way and potentially this way to try to recapture this area. When they do that, and if they are successful with that, that's going to force civilians out of this area because the Russians are going to forcibly evacuate them. And they can do that under the provisions of these martial - of this martial law edict that they've presented right now.

KEILAR: And, Cedric, it's not just in these illegally annexed areas that we're seeing security tighten, right? We understand that's also happening within Russia proper. Putin is tightening security there. What kind of authority does that give local officials in Russia?

LEIGHTON: So, among other things, Brianna, what it does is it allows them to control the movement of people. They can control the movement of people into and out of the regions. And specifically, if you look right here, these are the border regions right in this area. And it also effects the border to Kazakhstan and the border to the southern areas, like Georgia and Azerbaijan and those countries. So, they're controlling movement, they're creating a situation where they can actually control dissent, and they're trying to, in essence, limit the movement of the population and the ability of the population to oppose the war.

KEILAR: Yes, we just see the effects of this growing and growing inside of Russia.

Cedric, thank you so much for walking us through that.

LEIGHTON: You bet, Brianna.

KEILAR: Some more turmoil for the United Kingdom's new prime minister. Calls are growing louder for Liz Truss to quit.

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[06:48:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: This morning, more than 12 million people are under lockdown and operations have ground to a halt in China's major manufacturing hub for Apple iPhone. This after officials identified 24 coronavirus cases across the city as that country sticks to a stringent zero Covid policy.

CNN has reporters around the world covering all the latest.

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NADA BASHIR, CNN REPORTER: I'm Nada Bashir in London.

And in Iran, pro-athlete Elnaz Rekabi has met with the country's sports minister amid concerns she may face repercussions for competing in South Korea with her hair uncovered. According to state media, the minister expressed his support for Rekabi and encouraged her to continue pursuing her career. Upon her return from Seoul on Wednesday, Rekabi told state media that she had competed without her mandatory hijab accidentally and apologized for any confusion cause. But human rights groups have expressed concern that she may have been speaking under duress and could still be facing pressure from the Iranian regime. This as nationwide protests continue to gain momentum with women and girls across the country publicly defying the regime's severe restrictions on women's rights and strict dress code regulations.

STEFANO POZZEBON, JOURNALIST: I am Stefano Pozzebon in Bogota, Columbia.

And in Mexico, thousands of migrants, most of them Venezuelans, are finding themselves stranded in part because of a recent decision from the White House to expand Title 42 to Venezuelans. The measure allows U.S. border patrols to deport back into Mexico, undocumented migrants that are found on U.S. soil on public health grounds. But these migrants who were traveling from South America, through Mexico, up towards the U.S. southern border are saying that their dreams of relocating to America are now in fragmented, that their life has been thrown into limbo.

SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Scott McLean on Downey Street in London, where many are wondering how much longer the occupant of Number 10, Prime Minister Liz Truss, can stay in power.

[06:50:08]

Last night there were chaotic scenes reported in parliament over a vote that conservative MPs were told to vote against. It was ultimately voted down, but opposition lawmakers reported seeing shouting, bullying, and even some conservative MPs being physically manhandled in the voting with the government. Earlier, the home secretary, Suella Braverman, tendered her resignation. And in her letter she not so subtly seemed to suggest that Truss should follow her out the door.

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KEILAR: All right, some extreme weather just across the spectrum taking shape here. Freeze warnings and watches in effect from Ohio to Georgia, while parts of the west are bracing for some record high temperatures.

Let's get right to meteorologist Chad Myers.

I mean, look at that map behind you. That is nuts.

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: It really is. I mean temperatures in the east are well below normal. Temperatures in the west are 20 degrees above normal. And, finally, this comes to an end because it's going to flip flop by the middle of the week.

This weather brought to you by Safelite, your vehicle glass and recalibration experts.

So, let's get right to it.

Temperatures across the east are cold. Frost and freeze warnings all the way down to Florida for that matter. Temperatures right now in Chicago is 27 with a little bit of wind. But look what happens on Friday and Saturday, temperatures just swing the other way. And a big snow event is about to come to the Rockies as well. Chicago, Saturday you get to 78 degrees after being below freezing right now.

The west is warm. Certainly warm and also smoky because the air quality is not very good in many spots. We still have wildfires burning. But maybe they can come to an end because by really Monday into Tuesday, a significant storm is coming and we'll see some snow, could be feet deep out there in the west, Brianna. We will certainly take that to try to get rid of some of this western drought.

Back to you.

KEILAR: Let's hope so.

MYERS: Yes.

KEILAR: Chad, thank you for that.

MYERS: You bet.

KEILAR: A new study finds that black heart failure patients are less likely to get the therapies they need. So, what is driving this troubling statistic?

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[06:56:48]

KEILAR: There's a new study out now that finds inequities in how heart failure patients are treated based on their race. White patients twice as likely as black patients to receive mechanical heart pumps or heart transplants according to this study.

CNN health reporter Jacqueline Howard is with us now.

Tell us more about this. This is incredibly alarming.

JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN HEALTH REPORTER: It is, Brianna. But, you know, this study gives us new data on what black patients and black physicians have long noticed, which is that in some cases black patients tend to receive -- or they tend to be less likely to receive the same quality of care as their white peers.

And in this particular study, researchers looked at 377 heart failure patients. These are patients around the same age with similar conditions. And the researchers found that advanced therapies, like heart pumps or heart transplants, were performed in 11 percent of the black patients but 22 percent of the white patients. So you see the key difference there.

And the researchers said that that difference did not appear to correlate with what the patients asked for or the type of care they preferred. It really appeared to be a consequence of provider decision making.

KEILAR: I mean, that is alarming. The - this also - I mean it just reminds me, Jacqueline, yesterday we were talking about disparities when it came to IVF babies.

HOWARD: Yes.

KEILAR: You know, black babies and how they have worse outcomes than white babies. And here we are talking about this. Have researchers explained why this disparity exists in this decision-making process?

HOWARD: They did. In this study the researchers wrote that this inequity could be a consequence of structural racism, discrimination or provider bias. And my Jacqueline translation of that is, in some cases, this might be a consequence of patients not being heard and their conditions not seen as dire as their peers.

And this type of inequity has been seen in other aspects of medical care. With maternity care we've seen this where patients have not been really listened to and, as a result, black women are three times as likely to die due to pregnancy-related complications. We've seen this inequity in pain management.

So, this study just adds to our growing understanding of some of the racial inequities when it comes to the medical care people receive.

Brianna.

KEILAR: Yes. They're undeniable. We're talking about it many days in a row here.

Jacqueline, thank you for that.

And NEW DAY continues right now.

A federal judge says Donald Trump likely committed crimes in his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

I'm Brianna Keilar, with John Berman.

In some new CNN reporting this morning, Judge David Carter issuing an opinion that former President Trump knew his claims of voter fraud were false but he continued to make them anyway, in public and in court, signing off on legal documents. This stems from emails between the former president and Attorney John Eastman, who worked with Trump and his allies to push the bogus claims of election fraud.

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