Return to Transcripts main page

New Day Saturday

DOJ Took 11 Sets Of Classified Documents From Mar-a-Lago; Dems' Economic Bill Heads To Biden's Desk For Signing After House Passage; Back-To-Back Reports Suggest Inflation In U.S. Is Cooling; Mortgage Rates Climbs To 5.22 percent, After Dropping To 4.99 percent Last Week. Aired 8-9a ET

Aired August 13, 2022 - 08:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:00:34]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. Buenos dias and welcome to your "New Day." I'm Boris Sanchez.

AMARA WALKER, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Boris. I'm Amara Walker.

New details in that FBI search of former President Trump's home. What we're learning from the now unsealed warrant including what was removed from Trump's home and the potential crimes being investigated.

SANCHEZ: Plus, a big win for President Biden as Congress passes his $750 billion health care and climate bill, the immediate impact you are going to feel when President Biden signs it next week.

WALKER: And author Salman Rushdie attacked on stage and airlifted to the hospital. We'll tell you what we know about his condition this morning.

SANCHEZ: As inflation is cooling, gas prices are dropping, but the cost of other items remains painfully high. What the new numbers say about the current state of the economy?

Welcome to your weekend. It's Saturday, August 13th. We are grateful to be with you. Good morning, Amara.

WALKER: Good morning, Boris. It's so good to be with you. I feel like I've been missing a little bit of Boris in my life. So, it's nice to be here.

SANCHEZ: A pleasure to be with you as always.

WALKER: Thanks, Boris.

Well we begin with new details this morning on what led the FBI to execute an unprecedented search warrant on former President Trump's home. According to court documents unsealed Friday, investigators removed 11 sets of classified documents from Mar-a-Lago including some material that were marked as top secret SCI which stands for Sensitive Compartmented Information. That is one of the highest levels of government classification. Now those documents are only supposed to be viewed at a secure government location.

SANCHEZ: Notably, the unsealed search warrant also identifies three potential crimes, the Justice Department is investigating violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice and criminal handling of government records. To be clear, so far, no charges have been filed in the investigation. But Republicans in Congress are demanding more answers from the FBI.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MICHAEL TURNER (R-OH): There are a number of things that they could show us and I don't want to speculate on what those would be that would obviously rise to the level of, of maybe you didn't have any options, but I'd be very, very, very surprised as to what those are considering the breadth of what they could have done besides this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALKER: And in response to the Mar-a-Lago raid, former President Trump claiming that he declassified all the documents seized by the FBI. That there is no evidence of that.

Let's go now to CNN senior justice correspondent, Evan Perez for more on this. Evan, break this all down for us. Hi, there, Evan.

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Amara, Boris, good morning.

Look, I think the former President is trying to make his best defense, which is why are you coming breaking into my house, which they didn't do, by the way? Why don't you come into my house to get information that I had declassified? And what's interesting about what the -- what we find from this document that was released by the Federal Court yesterday, is that we know now that they're investing in these three, investigating these three crimes, including the Espionage Act statute, which by the way, does not make a reference to classified information. It refers to National Defense Information, which is the same thing, but it sort of gives prosecutors the way to get around what Donald Trump's defense is likely to be, which is, this is information that I had the right as President to declassify, and I did that.

Trump is coming up with an even more exotic version of this saying that just by sending documents from the main part of the White House to the residence, he was declassifying things. And of course, we know that that's not exactly the way things work.

What we know is that the FBI is still going through these documents. These documents were taken to the FBI field office in Miami, where they have the secure rooms and facilities to be able to go through these things. They're going to do everything including fingerprinting these documents to see who may have handled this. We know that they took surveillance video. They subpoena that surveillance video from Mar-a-Lago, so they know who's had access to this area in the last, you know, in the last few months. [08:05:07]

And what this investigation is right now is, you know that there might be people beyond the former president who could have legal exposure here. Because again, this is -- these are very broad laws that they're looking at. The other thing I want to mention is that one of the three statutes that's being looked at here is one that is has to do with obstruction. And it is a very broad version of obstruction in the sense that it has to do with impeding any kind of federal investigation. So it's not just this investigation. It could be any other thing that the investigators determined they or they believe Donald Trump was or someone else was trying to impede in their work. Boris, Amara.

SANCHEZ: Evan Perez, thanks for the reporting. Please stay with us because I want to expand the conversation now and bring in Renato Mariotti, he's a former federal prosecutor and the host of the On Topic Podcast.

Renator, good morning, we're grateful to have you.

Which of these three federal crimes stands out most to you that Trump could potentially be charged with?

RENATO MARIOTTI, FMR FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Actually, the one that Evan just mentioned the obstruction statute, and here's why. I think the other two statutes that were mentioned in that search one are statutes that we expected. In other words, if the former president had taken top secret information and brought it to his residence and kept it there after his presidency, I'd expect both of those statutes to be cited. I will say I did not expect an obstruction statute to be included in that list. And what's important about it is I think it could be a potential plus factor here. And what I mean is, I think, you know, if all that happened was that the former president took classified information and brought it to his residence and was keeping it there. That mere fact while it's certainly could be the basis of charges, and I have the feeling if me or Evan had nuclear secrets in our basement, then we would be charged. I think that the Justice Department would be potentially less likely to charge in that circumstance.

But I think potential obstruction of justice if he was withholding those documents to impede the government or some investigation, I think that's the sort of thing that might lead the Justice Department to pursue charges.

SANCHEZ: Renato, staying with you, the one that caught my eye was the potential for violations of the Espionage Act. You hear espionage you think spying. But this isn't necessarily about spying, right?

MARIOTTI: Absolutely correct. So that's an important thing for our viewers to understand is that the Espionage Act is a very old and very broad statute. It covers a whole variety of activities that do not encompass what we would ordinarily consider. Espionage, you can violate the Espionage Act and not been spying in the traditional sense. But it does cover the misuse of classified, basically, what's called closely held information in that statute was actually enacted before the classification system. And I expected that statute to be listed on the search warrant.

SANCHEZ: And Evan, you noted the likelihood that some of these documents may contain information that is sensitive in a national security perspective. Will we ever find out exactly what's in these documents that were seized?

PEREZ: Well look, you can look at previous cases where people were charged with this statute, which is U.S. Code 793. And there's some there's a very interesting case of a former NSA employee who was charged with this, you can look through the court documents and you see very cryptic references to describe what these documents are. So, the answer is likely Boris will have maybe some hints of what it is but probably not. Because these are viewed, these documents that the government believes were taken. You know, were being stored improperly at Mar-a-Lago are so sensitive, they're TSSCI, they are things that are classified as Special Access Programs. We know for a fact that at least some of the documents that were taken from the -- from Mar-a- Lago, were in that category. These are again, these are the most closely guarded secrets, even if you have top secret clearance, you need additional clearance and in additional reason to be able to get access to these things.

So, things like nuclear weapons programs, things like some of our signals intelligence, how we spy on other countries, things like that, that are so sensitive, that would never be allowed to go to someone's beach house in Palm Beach, right? So that's one reason why you the government guards these things. And it gives you a sense of why they took this very extraordinary step, because this is a thing that has been going on over 18 months. The former president has essentially been stonewalling. And despite the fact that they were claiming that they've been cooperating, it's absolutely clear that the prosecutors believe that that is not true.

[08:10:15]

SANCHEZ: Renato, what do you make of the arguments from the former president that he declassified this material, and that he would have handed it over if only DOJ had asked for it?

MARIOTTI: Well, the latter argument, I think, is verifiably false. I mean, the latter argument is problematic for him. I don't think that -- I think that defense won't, we won't hear that repeated over time. Because, as Evan mentioned a moment ago, the government actually went to the former President and his team, they asked for this information, he was served with a subpoena. And obviously, they didn't provide all of it, because if they did, they would have had -- the government would have had no reason to obtain a search warrant. And when they executed that search warrant, they wouldn't have found anything. So I think, you know, certainly they did ask for it, and they didn't get what they needed.

Now, as soon as declassification thing I mean, we've heard all sorts of things, fairly fanciful ideas that you mentioned earlier that, you know, every time he took something up to the bedroom, it was automatically declassified. It's a little -- it sounds like something you made up, I think it's something a jury would have trouble swallowing as a potential defense. But it's better than some of the other defenses we've heard, because it's slightly more plausible than the fact that it was all done to plant evidence or some of the other stuff.

I think the part of the issue for him, though, is that for a lot of the statutes, the fact that something is technically classified is really not a turning point under the statutes. Is particularly the obstruction statute, but even for the other statutes, it is a factor. It's something that juror would consider. And I think it would be important, but I don't know if there -- if he could get off on some technicality regarding the classification.

SANCHEZ: Renato Mariotti, Evan Perez, we got to leave the conversation there. Appreciate you sharing part of your Saturday with us.

WALKER: The Democrats, major economic health care and climate bill is headed to President Biden's desk for his signature after Congress passed it along party lines yesterday, specifically the House. The $750 billion package represents the largest climate investment in U.S. history, makes big changes to health policy and it also reduces the federal deficit.

CNN congressional reporter Daniella Diaz joining us now. Hi there, Daniella. So tell us first, how significant this is for Democrats.

DANIELLA DIAZ, CNN CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER: Amara, we cannot overstate how significant this is because this is a goal for the Democratic Party that they've had ever since President Joe Biden entered the White House, they wanted to see a climate package. They wanted to see a health care package, a tax package, they were able to get all of those things in this deal that the House passed yesterday.

Now, what a little bit about this package. It would reduce the deficit and be paid for through new taxes, including a 15% minimum tax on large corporations and a 1% tax on stock buybacks. It would also boost the Internal Revenue Service's ability to collect taxes. That's how it's being paid for. Now, it also gives Medicare the power for the first time ever to negotiate the prices on prescription drugs, and it extends Affordable Care Act's subsidies.

Now probably the biggest provision of this is that it would, it's a huge climate deal. And it would be the biggest climate investment in U.S. history by reducing U.S. carbon emissions up to 40% by 2030. Of course, climate activists really celebrating this deal. Now, of course, President Joe Biden praising House Democrats in a tweet yesterday, they every single House Democrat supported this legislation, he said, the choice we face as Americans whether to protect the already powerful or find the courage to build a future where everybody has a shot. Today, I proudly watched as House Democrats chose families over special interests.

Really remarkable because usually in the House, we do see sometimes one or two more moderate House Democrats vote against legislation in the hopes to keep their seat. Now yesterday, we saw every house Democrat support this bill and every Republican vote against this bill. And of course, progressives celebrating this deal as well. Congressional Progressive Caucus, Chairwoman Pramila Jayapal telling CNN yesterday that this is a huge climate deal and really celebrating that fact.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. PRAMILA JAYAPAL (D-WA): To me, this is such this is the kind of moment that you live for in Congress, frankly, you know, something that is going to deliver real change where we can say to young people, you're going to have a planet because we are going to cut carbon emissions 40% by 2030. It's really It feels fantastic.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DIAZ: Amara, what we're going to see in the next couple of weeks in the next couple of months before the 2022 midterms are these Democrats campaigning on this deal, on this legislation. Of course President Joe Biden expected to sign it this next week once it's signed it goes into law and a lot of these provisions we will see an immediate effect implemented. Amara.

[08:15:17]

WALKER: Yes, great. Daniella Diaz, thank you for that.

SANCHEZ: Award winning author Salman Rushdie was attacked on stage at a book event yesterday. He's been targeted for 30 years. And yesterday, an attacker struck. The latest on his condition, next.

Plus, water samples in New York revealing the polio virus may be circulating there. Why health officials fear it could be more widespread than originally thought?

"New Day" is back in just a few minutes.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SANCHEZ: Salman Rushdie, the author whose writings led to death threats from Iran in the 1980s remains hospitalized after he was stabbed multiple times during a lecture in New York.

[08:20:01]

WALKER: Yes, it was a frightening scene. Officials say the 75-year-old Rushdie was stabbed at least once in the neck and once in the abdomen. His agents say he could lose an eye and a suspect is in custody.

CNN's Polo Sandoval is outside the hospital where Rushdie was taken in Erie, Pennsylvania. Hey, Polo, what do we know?

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, officials yesterday Amara and Boris announced that celebrated author he is recovering at this hospital in Erie, Pennsylvania just about 40 miles away from where the attack happened yesterday morning. The entire global community in the White House all condemning yesterday's attack and praying for Rusdie's quick recovery. However, his agent telling the New York Times yesterday that news on his clients condition is not good, not only as you mentioned that he faces the possibility of losing an eye, suffered extensive nerve damage as well as liver damage as well. And at this morning, he is breathing with the help of a ventilator according to what the agent told The New York Times.

A motive, certainly still a very big question here for investigators as they search -- as they serve search warrants at a property associated with the suspect in New Jersey. It is certainly not lost on investigators that Rushdie decades really with that, with those looming death threats after the publication of The Satanic Verses some 30 -- 30 some years ago. Investigators certainly looking at that, after Iranian leadership basically issued that religious decree calling for the 75-year-olds death, one that was reaffirmed as recent as 2017.

I want you to hear directly from Rushdie as he reflected on living with that constant threat, constantly looking over his shoulder, but at the same time, embracing living his life and the relative safety of living in a Western country. This is a portion of that interview in 2019 with CNN.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SALMAN RUSHDIE, AUTHOR: I mean, it may have been an unpleasant decade, but it was the right fight. You know, it was fighting for the things that I most believe in against things that I most dislike which bigotry and fanaticism, censorship, and so on. So yes, and I came out of it in a way clearer.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANDOVAL: At that event yesterday, that lecture event at the Chautauqua Institution there was a New York State Trooper as well as a sheriff's deputy that quickly sprang into action. The suspect that was quickly apprehended identified by authorities as 24-year-old Hadi Matar. Investigators spending all day yesterday looking into a residence linked to him also going through electronic devices and a backpack that was recovered at the scene trying to find out if Rushdie's previous writings potentially inspired this attack charges against Matar was repenting this morning.

Amara, Boris, back to you.

WALKER: All right. Polo Sandoval, Thank you.

SANCHEZ: Health officials in New York City say that polio is likely spreading after finding samples of the virus in wastewater. The discovery comes after one person in upstate New York was recently diagnosed with polio, a case the CDC is calling just the very tip of the iceberg.

WALKER: While 90% of people who contract polio will exhibit no symptoms, the virus can cause meningitis that that leads to paralysis. Now New York's mayor is urging unvaccinated residents to get the polio shot saying his city is facing a trio of dangerous diseases.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ERIC ADAMS, MAYOR (D-NY): We are dealing with a trifecta. COVID is still very much here. Polio we have identified polio in our sewage. And we're still dealing with the monkeypox crises. We're coordinating and we're addressing the threats as they come before us. And we're prepared to deal with them, and with the assistance of Washington D.C.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALKER: The monkeypox outbreak in New York and other cities is forcing federal officials to authorize a plan intended to stretch the vaccine supply. It would allow healthcare workers to use a lower dose of the vaccine administered in a different way.

SANCHEZ: Now but that strategy is raising concern with the vaccines manufacturer. CNN's Jacqueline Howard breaks this down for us,

JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN REPORTER: Boris and Amara, first here's a breakdown of the nation's monkeypox vaccine strategy. The FDA has authorized administering the monkeypox vaccine using a technique called an intradermal injection. Now, some vaccines can be administered into the muscle and that's called an intramuscular injection or they can be administered into the fatty layer below the skin. That's called a subcutaneous injection. And that's the way the monkeypox vaccine has been injected during this outbreak.

But with the new FDA authorization, the vaccine now also can be administered in between the skin layer or intradermally. And intradermal injections can involve smaller doses than what's used with subcutaneous or intramuscular injections.

[08:25:10]

So with the monkey pox vaccine, the FDA says a fifth of a dose can be administered intradermally. And it sees that as a way to stretch the nation's vaccine supply. But there are some concerns about this, especially since intradermal injections require special technique and care.

Here's how New York City's Health Commissioner Dr. Ashwin Vasan describes it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ASHWIN VASAN, COMMISSIONER, NYC DEPT. OF HEALTH AND MENTAL HYGIENE: It requires real thoughtfulness with respect to the technical issues around it, the safety issues around it the feasibility, the training and staffing needed to dose, the vaccine reliably, the storage conditions, all the supply chain management issues around it. So those are all real things, which we're wrestling with as we speak and trying to figure out the best way to potentially roll this out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOWARD: Dr. Vasan was speaking with the Washington Post in that clip, and we heard him say that New York is really wrestling with this. But in the meantime, on the federal level, the FDA stands by the strategy as a way to make the most of the nation's vaccine supply at this time. Amara, Boris, back to you.

SANCHEZ: Jacqueline, thank you so much.

It seems that prices are starting to go down especially gas stations across the country. Still ahead, other signs indicating that inflation may have peaked.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:30:44]

WALKER: All right, so the good news is that inflation may have peed. Recent data shows that consumer and producer prices are falling. But we're still paying more for groceries right now. The cost of eggs, flour, chicken and milk, you can see that they're significantly higher than just a year ago.

And yesterday, we got a report from the University of Michigan that shows consumers for the second month in a row are a bit more confident about prices. But to be clear, confidence remains near record lows. So what does all this say about the state of the U.S. economy and where it's going? That's what I want to know.

For that, I'm joined now by Beth Ann Bovino, the U.S. Chief Economist at S&P Global. Good morning to you Beth, thank you so much for joining us. Let's start with consumer confidence. What's the takeaway from Friday's report?

BETH ANN BOVINO, CHIEF U.S. ECONOMIST, S&P GLOBAL: Well, I think people are responding to but basically a bit lower prices at the gas pump which takes out a huge chunk of their disposable income. And they're probably feeling a little bit more optimistic about what's going -- what's going to be going down the road. I suspect expectations also dropped a little bit as well as most likely with their inflation expectations and that's key. If people start to believe that inflation will be lower a few years from now, that means they're going to feel optimistic about what to expect in their pocketbook later on.

WALKER: Yes, and just to be specific there. The average gas prices just under $4, a 3.99. Prices are falling, they are still much higher than last year. But is that a good side regarding inflation in general? Will it -- is it going to continue on this downward trend? What's the forecast?

BOVINO: Well, there's a catch to this. It's good that prices are falling down. We see it in gasoline prices. And as you had mentioned, it's still $1.50 above where it was before the pandemic. So it's still incredibly high, but it's good it's going in the right direction. Other commodities are falling as well, also positive. But why is that? Is because of affordability. People can't afford the prices that they're facing at the gas pump and elsewhere so they're cutting back. Reducing their errands, taking vacations locally, rather than taking a trip across the United States. This is all good, but it also slows the economy. So with these lower prices means an economy that's weakening as well.

WALKER: And for the family that's sitting at home watching us right now, I mean, they want to know when are the prices of food, right, groceries, milk and eggs. What is that going to go down?

BOVINO: It's taking some time. And the only downside pressure that we're seeing on inflation is because people are starting to change their habits, reduce the kind of food they're buying. But a lot of these price pressures are coming from abroad with the Russia and Ukraine conflict, for example. When will that end? When will supply chains open up, is a big question.

We do have some improvement elsewhere. For example, China is starting to soften in terms of supply chain disruptions. But if that doesn't change anytime soon, unfortunately, those prices, those high prices are probably stayed with us for a bit longer than we'd hoped.

WALKER: I'm curious to know your thoughts on the Inflation Reduction Act that President Biden has indicated he will be signing soon. Look, it's $750 billion in spending when it comes to climate change, which is the bulk of the bill and of course, health care costs as well. But that's a lot of spending, right? Overall, do you see this bringing down inflation and when?

BOVINO: I would say that it's a help, but it's -- I don't see it as a near term help. When I've looked at an infrastructure work, infrastructure projects, usually what happens is it's not -- it happens, but it happens after the crisis is over. I'm hoping that's not the case this time, but again, I'm a little bit skeptical on what we'll be seeing.

The positive of course, is that climate, you know, addressing climate change, also addressing those health costs that people are facing will be a big benefit for those people's pocketbooks. But it is still something that may not happen near term. It's probably a medium to later Trump story.

WALKER: Got it. Yes, that makes sense. And lastly, for those who are potentially in the market to buy a home or are just watching mortgage rates, which are rising again above 5 percent this week. This time last year it was just a 2.87 percent if you're able to lock in those rates from a while back, you're obviously quite lucky.

[08:35:10]

But -- and there's also been a lot of criticism against the Feds, right, for, I guess, perhaps moving too slowly to raise rates. What are -- what is your thought on the housing market, and if, you know, home prices will ever go down? BOVINO: Well, what goes up usually comes down. So I guess I can say that positive piece of news. but I will have the negative as an economist, we always have that other hand. I would say we did a piece on housing affordability. And what we found is with higher prices earlier on, extremely high prices higher than I believe, record highs in some cases.

What we saw was that people could afford them because their monthly payments were low. Given interest rates were incredibly low, that has now changed. Now we're seeing that a lot of people are squeezed out of the market because of those high prices, meaning those monthly payments have gone up. We see now that about 60 percent of households are, you know, 60 percent of households all the way up to the average household. Median household income is now squeezed out of the market. And that's our and that's a concern. That also means that with demand drying up, that also means that prices will start to fall as well.

WALKER: OK. I guess the key here is cautiously hopeful. Beth Ann Bovino, thank you very much.

BOVINO: Thank you.

SANCHEZ: So former President Donald Trump made a lot of claims about the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago. Up next, we're going to run those through a fact check. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:41:11]

WALKER: All right, welcome back. Here as a check of some of the top stories we are following. In Arlington, Virginia, at least 14 people were injured Friday after a vehicle crashed into a pub, causing the building to burst into flames. According to police, eight people were taken to area hospitals, four of whom were critically injured, and another six were treated at the scene and released. They're still investigating the cause of the crash.

SANCHEZ: Johnson & Johnson announced it's going to stop using talc in its baby powder worldwide next year. Instead, it's going to make it with cornstarch. But talc-based powder which hasn't been sold in the United States and Canada since 2020, is it the center of tens of thousands of lawsuits filed by women who've developed ovarian cancer after using regular talcum powder? Johnson & Johnson says it remains confident in the safety of its product.

So former President Donald Trump and his allies have turned to a familiar defense strategy after the FBI searched his Florida home, confiscating 11 sets of classified documents.

WALKER: Yes, Trump has sought to discredit the FBI's actions and what they found using a slew of falsehoods, claiming everything from evidence being planted to arguing his predecessor did the exact same thing, and neither of which have any basis, in fact. CNN's Daniel Dale joining us now. Daniel, it is so important to have you fact checking all this. And you have a new piece out today where you kind of divide what we have heard from Trump and his allies into two categories, and one of which is those baseless conspiracy theories. Talk to us about that.

DANIEL DALE, CNN REPORTER: There are just so many different conspiracy theories from Trump and his allies at once. So Trump has in his familiar just asking questions kind of style suggested that the FBI could have, as you said, planted evidence. His lawyers have been even more explicit in floating that idea. Kentucky Senator Rand Paul said the FBI is probably planting evidence, so did a host on Fox.

Senator Marco Rubio of Kentucky promoted a different conspiracy theory. He was saying that he doesn't think the FBI was looking for documents at all, they just wanted to get into Trump's house and look for whatever they could find. And then we had people like a right-wing host on the media outlet, Real America's Voice, who basically delivered a QAnon style conspiracy theory, saying this raid was designed to thwart Trump from exposing these satanic disgusting criminals in government. None of this has any basis in fact, whatsoever, but all these people keep saying it.

SANCHEZ: Daniel, your piece also explores how Trump often uses whataboutisms to try to defend himself, often invoking his 2016 rival Hillary Clinton and her emails. There really isn't a comparison for what happened here, right?

DALE: There is not and so what about ism? For people who aren't familiar with the term is basically just saying, what about this? What about that? It's usually what about Democrats. And I think the big whataboutism this time was one about Barack Obama. So Trump and some of his allies started saying, well, Barack Obama took 30 million or that it became 33 million documents after his presidency to Chicago. And Trump's had much of them, many of them were classified.

Well, that compelled the National Archives and Records Administration to come up with a statement completely debunking this. They said that they, the National Archives, maintain exclusive legal and physical custody of all of those Obama Presidential Records, that they weren't the ones who took 30 million records to the Chicago area to their own facility in the Chicago area. And they said that was not classified information that they took the classified documents and sent them to another facility in the Washington area, again, their own facility.

So this Obama thing was completely made up, but it still became one of Trump's main talking points. And, guys, I think that that tells you something important.

SANCHEZ: Indeed. Daniel Dale, thank you for the fact checking.

[08:45:02]

WALKER: Whenever I hear of what about this, what about that, I think of my whiny kids fighting and saying, well what about Lukas, he did the same thing. Thanks guys, appreciate it.

Well, Londoners can't wash their cars right now due to the current heatwave in England. Next, we'll take a look at the extreme weather patterns hitting Europe this summer.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SANCHEZ: Just in this morning, rescue efforts are still underway in Mexico as dive teams were attempting to reach 10 miners trapped inside a flooded coal mine. On Friday, divers work to clear debris inside the mineshaft after multiple attempts to reach the miners the day before failed. The miners have been trapped for 10 days now after accidentally breaching an abandoned tunnel that flooded the mine.

We're able to escape but rescuers have been unable to contact the 10 still inside.

[08:50:08]

WALKER: A 22-year-old man is dead and 17 others injured. Three of them seriously after a stage collapsed at a Spanish music festival near Valencia Spain. Officials say the collapse was caused by a strong gust of wind. Spain's National Weather Service says wind gusts were up to 50 miles per hour with temperatures reaching as high as a blistering 104 degrees. This morning, the festival management announced the festival has been suspended.

SANCHEZ: There is no video this morning of the Taliban violently breaking up a rare women's protest in Kabul. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(Gun Shots)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: That is gunfire breaking out after more than 50 women gathered outside the education ministry building, chanting food, work and freedom. The protests comes almost one year after the Taliban seized control of Kabul. Since then, the group has significantly rolled back women's rights requiring them to cover their faces in public and banning girls from attending secondary school.

On that note, we have a quick programming note to share with you. It's been nearly one year since the United States withdrew from Afghanistan. And tomorrow, Fareed Zakaria is going to take a look back in a GPS special. He's actually sitting down with a former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, to ask him directly why he left his country during that turbulent time. "The fall of Kabul One Year Later" airs tomorrow right here on CNN at 10:00 a.m.

WALKER: Well, parts of Western Europe are dealing with record heat and drought. Just yesterday, Ireland experienced its hottest day ever for the month of August hitting 89 degrees.

SANCHEZ: And CNN Salma Abdelaziz has more on the extreme weather conditions affecting parts of Europe.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN REPORTER (voice-over): 5,000 hectares, more than 12,000 football fields burnt in a single night. Temperatures inside the fire zone in this community and grown France reached 1,000 degrees Celsius, according to the local fire department. Enough to bend steel.

MATTHIEU JOMAIN, GIRONDE FIREFIGHTERS' SPOKESMAN (through translation): We are still in the phase of trying to contain the fire. Our mission is to direct it where we want, where there is fear of vegetation, where the layout allows our vehicles to position themselves best in the most efficient manner.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): Scorching temperatures and months of dry weather are causing dangerous conditions across Europe. The continent is in the midst of its fourth heatwave, the summer. E.U. Chief Ursula von der Leyen tweeted Friday that help was incoming for Portugal, Slovenia, Albania and France as part of the block's civil protection mechanism.

Following an emergency plea from Paris on Thursday, the E.U. sent four firefighting planes to France's Southwest where emergency services have battled wildires for six consecutive nights. Reinforcements from Romania started to arrive Friday morning.

CRISTIAN BUHAIANU, ROMAN FIRE CHIEF: Doesn't matter the country, we are firefighters and we have to help people around the world.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): In the U.K., the London fire brigade remains on high alert and describes the city as tinderbox dry. Water companies have introduced bans given the drought conditions, stopping people from watering their gardens, washing cars or cleaning windows. Even the River Thames has dried up further downstream than ever before.

ALISDAIR NAULLS, RIVERS TRUST ENGAGEMENT OFFICER: This is the climate crisis in action that I am stood in about that deep of the Thames 15 kilometers into it. I should be a lot wetter than I am right now.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): Germany's river Rhine was also exceptionally low, threatening further disruption on Germany's most important inland waterway. Used for transporting chemicals and grain, the Rhine is particularly crucial for the movement of coal, which is in higher demand as Germany raises to fill storage facilities ahead of next winter.

Meteorologists say the current wave of extreme temperature sweeping Europe is associated with a robust dome of high atmospheric pressure. Not only does that dome bring hot air into the region, it also suppresses storms and clouds, trapping the heat and preventing it from rising. Scientists say that every heatwave the world experiences today has been made hotter because of human induced climate change.

Salma Abdelaziz, CNN, London.

WALKER: That's frightening. On the next episode of "Patagonia: Life on the Edge of the World," CNN takes you behind the scenes to show how this new series was made.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: By the time the storm passes, the crew have just one day left before they have to return to port.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's usually tricky. Not this tricky. This has been like spectacularly difficult.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And then Thomas (ph) get some exciting news. Wales had been spotted only two hours away.

[08:55:15]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translation): Blue whale! To our 1:00.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We got some whales. Lives.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translation): There are two.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A big blue and a small blue.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALKER: "Patagonia" airs tomorrow night at 9:00 p.m. right here on CNN.

SANCHEZ: Hey, thank you so much for being with us this morning. Amara and I are going to be back just an hour from now.

WALKER: Yes, we will. Smerconish is next. We'll see you soon.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)