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The Situation Room

Can Walking Prevent Cognitive Decline?; Trump Calls For Prosecution of Beyonce; Couple Killed in Arkansas State Park; Trump Threatens to Reduce Deadline on Russia. Aired 11:30a-12p ET

Aired July 28, 2025 - 11:30   ET

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

[11:30:00]

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WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Happening now: police searching for a suspect and asking for the public's help after a couple was killed while hiking with their two young children in an Arkansas state park in the Ozark Mountains this weekend.

The couple, Clinton and Cristen Brink, were discovered on a trail with rugged terrain and no cell phone service. Their daughters, just 7 and 9 years old, were unharmed.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have got the two witnesses here at the scene that talked to the little girls. When we walked in off to the kind of -- they didn't witness the crimes. They just met the girls on the trail.

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BLITZER: Authorities have not said how the couple was killed, but noted that they're investigating the incident as a double homicide.

Let's go live right now to CNN correspondent Dianne Gallagher.

Dianne, what do we know so far about what happened in that state park and the suspect authorities are searching for?

DIANNE GALLAGHER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, there is a manhunt under way right now, but the suspect description is vague and there are not a lot of details about exactly what happened on that remote walking trail in Devil's Den national park.

State Police have not revealed what weapon they believe was used. They also have not said anything about a possible motive, only saying they're investigating it as a double homicide. They found the bodies of 43-year-old Clinton and 41-year-old Cristen Brink on Saturday afternoon.

The Brinks had just moved to the area recently, Prairie Grove, Arkansas, up near the Oklahoma border. It's about 12 miles away from that state park. Now, police did say the two daughters were unharmed. They're safe with family right now, and it's unclear exactly what they did or did not witness at this time.

We do know that they had some kind of interaction, at least with people at the park, as you just heard there, as well as with the visitors center, where it appears they reported what happened to their parents. Take a listen to this call.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Washington County received a call from the visitors center. Two children are there. They advised that their parents were assaulted. One was possibly stabbed. The parents are missing.

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GALLAGHER: So here's the thing. Police are asking anyone who was either visiting the area or lives in the area to go through your pictures, your videos, your security cameras, see what you may have on those photos or those videos, because here is what they are asking you to look for.

They have a suspect description, a medium-build white male who was last seen wearing a shirt with rolled-up sleeves, dark pants, a dark ball cap, fingerless gloves, and sunglasses carrying a black backpack. They say that the suspect was seen driving toward the park exit in a black four-door sedan, possibly a Mazda, with a license plate that was covered by electrical or duct tape.

And he may have traveled on State Highway 170 or State Highway 220 near the park. They are asking anyone with information to reach out to them immediately and not to post it on social media first. Give it to the police, because it could compromise their investigation, they're saying.

Arkansas has upped police presence at state parks across the entire state, Wolf. They also have indefinitely, until further notice, closed walking trails at Devil's Den State Park and cordoned off that area, of course, where they found the Brink family.

BLITZER: All right, Dianne Gallagher, thanks very much for that update.

And we will be right back.

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BLITZER: New this morning, President Trump is threatening to cut short the 50-day deadline he has given Russia to end its war in Ukraine. Listen to this.

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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm going to make a new deadline of about 10 -- 10 or 12 days from today. There's no reason in waiting. There's no reason in waiting. It's 50 days. I want to be generous, but we just don't see any progress being made.

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BLITZER: All right, joining us here in THE SITUATION ROOM, CNN global affairs analyst Brett McGurk. He served the last four presidents and was the Middle East and North Africa coordinator with the National Security Council.

Brett, thanks very much for joining us.

How significant is it that President Trump is now shortening the deadline for Putin to stop this war?

BRETT MCGURK, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Wolf, it's a dramatic shift.

[11:40:00]

It was only in February when the president came in that he was berating Zelenskyy, kind of blaming Ukrainians for prolonging the war. He's now completely shifted policy. I think it's right. Sometimes, a new administration has to go through trying how they think things should go, and then, when reality bites, the real world intervenes.

Putin is still Putin. And now you see a shift. It's quite significant. Big question, though, with President Trump, does he stick to it? I think it's time for those secondary sanctions. There's a massive bipartisan consensus, as you know, in the Congress for this bill, which has been pending. Very few issues like this in Washington right now.

So, the president has that political wind at his back. And I think it's right. Only way to bring this war to a close is to demonstrate to Putin that the course he's on is not going to lead to his objectives. And he's suffering badly, and hopefully they can get something done.

BLITZER: When President Trump announced the 50-day deadline that he was giving Putin, it meant nothing, because Putin immediately, within a few days, was launching rockets and drones and missiles at civilian targets in Kyiv and other cities in Ukraine.

How do you think he will respond to this new 10- to 12-day deadline?

MCGURK: Look, I think Putin's demonstrated, Wolf, as you -- you have been covering this for two years. He's all in. He wants to subjugate Ukraine.

But he's also -- he's suffered. As the president said today -- he's right -- they have taken a million military casualties, about 250,000 or so dead Russians in this war. That is only sustainable for so long. His economy is suffering. And these sanctions can bite.

But, look, he's -- this is going to take time. And I noticed that President Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, said it might take until 2029 to ultimately resolve this conflict. We don't want to wait that long. But the only way to resolve it is to demonstrate that the United States and our allies have the back of the Ukrainians and that Putin is not going to have free rein.

BLITZER: I remember, for a long time, Trump kept saying he could resolve it on day one if he was reelected.

MCGURK: Yes, a lot of presidents come in thinking that they can -- Eisenhower said, I'm going to go to Korea and the Korean War. It actually took him almost six or seven months. That war is still not formally ended.

Nixon said, I got a way, a secret plan to end Vietnam, spent his whole first term escalating the war. So a lot of presidents come in with very high expectations. And, again, the world is the world. Putin's Putin. Iran is Iran. And you have to adjust.

What I see the president here is taking ownership of a new approach. Again, he's got bipartisan support at his back in Congress. And I think it's the right approach.

BLITZER: I want to turn to the Middle East situation, because President Trump had some very strong words today for Iran. He's accusing Iran of meddling in the Israeli-Hamas peace talks that were going on. This is what Trump said today. Listen to this.

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TRUMP: I will say that Iran, I think, interjected themselves in this last negotiation. Can you imagine? The beating they took. We wiped out their nuclear possibilities. They can start again. If they do, we will wipe it out faster than you can wave your finger at it. We will have to do that. We will do that gladly, openly and gladly.

They have been saying -- Iran's been sending out bad signals.

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BLITZER: Are you surprised by how pointed this threat is?

MCGURK: That was very interesting, Wolf.

I mean, who has influence on Hamas in these negotiations? And I have led these negotiations in the past. Qatar, Turkey, Egypt, and Iran. And if that's true that one reason that Hamas really hardened its demands in the last week, one reason we did not get the cease-fire, and it's so tragic we did not have the cease-fire, had Hamas come in with a yes to this deal that was backed by the U.S., Qatar and Egypt, we'd be in a cease-fire today.

They apparently hardened their demands, and what the president said there is that Iran may have encouraged them to do so. That's a very serious allegation. Look, we've got to get the cease-fire in place, Wolf. It is -- the situation in Gaza is a disaster. I think putting pressure on the Israelis to get that aid moving again is the right thing to do, but don't give up on these negotiations.

And to get the -- to get to a result, it requires Qatar, Egypt, Turkey, and yes, Iran, putting pressure on Hamas as we work on the Israelis.

BLITZER: And on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza right now, international pressure clearly is building on the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who claims there is no hunger crisis, no starvation in Gaza.

The former President of the United States Barack Obama called for immediate action -- and I'm quoting Obama now -- "to prevent the travesty of innocent people dying of preventable starvation" -- close quote.

Is Israel's decision to allow more aid into Gaza now, in effect, an admission that there is a hunger and starvation crisis unfolding there?

MCGURK: I think, again, you see a big shift here from Israel and from the Trump administration.

Wolf, when I was working this issue, every morning at 7:30, no matter what else was going on, we had a call on the aid situation in Gaza. That was with our senior coordinator of the State Department who focused only on this issue, the aid issue in Gaza, with senior officials of USAID who are trusted by Israel and by the U.N. with our ambassador in Israel. If there's a bottleneck, we try to resolve it.

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The Trump administration eliminated that position, that senior coordinator position, eliminated USAID and a lot of these key positions, and actually allowed Israel to have a 10-week siege, a total blockade when the cease-fire broke down in March, which kind of led to this cascading set of events.

That was really catastrophic. You have got to stay on this every single day. The Israelis and the U.N. are always blaming each other, and the U.S. has to come in and say, hey, let's try to solve it, keep the aid flowing.

The one thing that's nonnegotiable here is the, aid has to flow to civilians. And a lot of things can be true. Hamas is the obstacle to a cease-fire deal. That's true. Hamas benefits directly in some ways and indirectly from the aid. It doesn't matter. You got to get aid to civilians. You got to keep it flowing.

An adjustment is being made here, but you got to -- every day, those gates have to be open, those trucks have to get in, as you work on ultimately getting this war ended with that cease-fire deal.

BLITZER: And Trump should name a special envoy to deal specifically with the humanitarian crisis in Gaza?

MCGURK: Important position. I saw it up close. We had Ambassador David Satterfield in that position, a very senior diplomat, and then Lise Grande, who was actually a U.N. official in the ISIS campaign, led the humanitarian response. We appointed her as an American official out of the State Department

to focus on this every single day. It is so complex and dynamic, but it takes constant, constant focus and effort, and you got to keep the aid flowing, period.

BLITZER: Brett McGurk, as usual, thanks very much for your expertise and your experience. We appreciate it very, very much.

And just ahead: Could walking, yes, walking, keep you younger? The new study revealing the impact your daily steps could have on your cognitive decline.

Plus, President Trump calls for the prosecution of Beyonce based on her ties to the Kamala Harris campaign. We're going to fact-check his claims.

Stay with us.

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[11:51:15]

BLITZER: President Trump is now putting the spotlight on Beyonce in a whole new way. He says she should be prosecuted, yes, prosecuted, for supposedly being paid millions to endorse Kamala Harris.

CNN's Daniel Dale is here with us. He's our fact-checker.

Daniel, walk us through what the president is saying and what the facts are.

DANIEL DALE, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: So the president posted on social media after midnight in Scotland on Sunday morning, where he's visiting.

And he wrote: "I'm looking at the large amount of money owed by the Democrats after the presidential election and the fact that they admit to paying probably illegally $11 million to singer Beyonce for an endorsement."

And he went on to say later in the post: "Kamala and all of those that received endorsement money broke the law. They should all be prosecuted."

So he's calling for the prosecution of Beyonce for getting paid $11 million to endorse Harris. Problem is, she did not get paid $11 million to endorse Harris. There is not a shred of evidence for this supposed $11 million payment. These claims have been circulating among obscure, random low-level Trump supporters on social media since the fall. Nobody has produced any support for it.

And the White House did not respond to my request for comment when I reached out this weekend. Now, federal elections spending records will do show a $165,000 payment from the Harris campaign to Beyonce's production company in the wake of the October 2024 event where Beyonce appeared with then-Vice President Harris. But two things about that. First of all, there's no evidence this was

quid pro quo payment for an endorsement. The Harris campaign said at the time that they were obligated by law to cover the ancillary costs related to celebrity appearances at their event. And, second of all, $165,000 is not $11 million, the figure the president keeps using.

Now, I did reach out to the Harris team about this. They didn't comment, but they referred me to a November 2024 post by Beyonce's mom, who I never thought would be one of my fact-check sources. But she wrote on social media back then that this claim was a lie. Beyonce did not get this money.

Now, I reached out to the White House. They didn't say anything. But I went looking to see what the president has said about this in the past. He attributed this claim in February to somebody just having showed him something. So the president himself has not specified where he got it either, Wolf.

BLITZER: Our fact-checker, Daniel Dale, as usual, thank you very, very much for that.

And also knew this morning, if you're worried about Alzheimer's disease, you may want to start getting some more steps each day. A 10- year study just out shows that walking can help protect against cognitive decline, especially among people with a genetic predisposition for Alzheimer's.

CNN's health reporter Jacqueline Howard has more.

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JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN HEALTH REPORTER: Walking has long been connected with health benefits, including cognitive benefits. And now this new research, it's being presented at the Alzheimer's Association international conference. It includes data on nearly 3,000 adults.

And it found that walking had a protective benefit against cognitive decline, especially in people with an APOE4 genetic variant. That's a genetic variant that's associated with an increased risk of Alzheimer's. So greater walking was tied to slower decline in people carrying this genetic variant.

And this association was slightly greater among black adults compared with white adults. So walking may have a slightly greater benefit for the black community. But, overall, this is an important message for people carrying a genetic risk factor tied to Alzheimer's disease. And it's estimated that at least one in five people are carrying a genetic variant that's associated with an increased risk for Alzheimer's.

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But even if you have this genetic risk factor, staying physically active is one thing you can do to reduce your risk. Some other things to consider, prevent diabetes or manage it if you have been diagnosed. Watch your blood pressure. Prevent or correct hearing loss. Limit your alcohol intake. Don't smoke. Those are all ways to help keep your brain healthy as you age.

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BLITZER: Good advice from Jacqueline Howard.

Jacqueline, thank you very, very much.

And, to our viewers, thanks very much for joining me this morning. You can always keep up with us on social media @WolfBlitzer and @PamelaBrownCNN. We will see you back here tomorrow morning and every weekday morning at 10:00 a.m. Eastern.

"INSIDE POLITICS," today with Manu Raju, is coming up next right after a short break.

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