Return to Transcripts main page

CNN News Central

Biden Says More Sanctions On Russia Possible After Navalny's Death; Spokesperson: Navalny's Body Will Not Be Released For 14 Days; Sources: Harris Hoping To Have Bigger Role In Reelection Effort. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired February 19, 2024 - 11:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:02:43]

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN HOST: Just in, President Biden says he's considering new sanctions against Russia in the wake of Alexei Navalny's death. This as Navalny's family is getting new word on how long it may take to get his body.

SARA SIDNER, CNN HOST: Vice President Kamala Harris is heading out on the campaign trail this week. Sources telling CNN though, she's pushing for changes within the campaign that she thinks will put the Biden-Harris team on a path to victory.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN HOST: One dorm room two people dead and no answer. The investigation now at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. I'm Kate Bolduan with Fredricka Whitfield and Sara Sidner. This is CNN News Central.

SINDER: We begin with developing news. President Biden said just moments ago the White House is considering additional sanctions on Russia after the death of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, while he was imprisoned in Russia. Let's get straight to CNN's MJ Lee, who was there listening to these comments. Do we have any idea of when this decision was made and when the sanctions might be put into place?

MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Sara. The President just returned to the White House after over the weekend saying repeatedly that he believes Vladimir Putin is directly to blame for Alexei Navalny's death, and that this is just one more sign of the Putin regime's brutality.

The news of his death, of course, as you know, has really brightened the spotlight on Congress, as additional U.S. funding for Ukraine remain stalled. And a question that I just asked the President is whether he would draw that connection between Congress's inaction in Navalny's death. And this is a part of his response to me just now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEE: Mr. President, would you go as far as to say that Alexei Navalny's blood is on the hands of House Republicans right now? JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I wouldn't use that term. They're making a big mistake not responding. Look, the way they're walking away from the threat of Russia, the way they're walking away from NATO, the way they're walking away from meeting our obligations, it's just shocking. I mean, they're wild. I've never seen anything like this.

LEE: Do you think Navalny's death will make any difference in nudging House Republicans to take up Ukraine aid? They're on the vacation right now.

[11:05:01]

BIDEN: I hope so. But I'm not sure anything is going to change.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEE: I know my second question was a little bit challenging to hear but I was asking him whether he thinks Navalny's death will do anything to nudge House Republicans to take action. He obviously didn't sound very optimistic. He also told another reporter that the U.S. is considering additional sanctions on Russia. But no additional details were given by the President when he was speaking to reporters.

You know, over the weekend, the President also talked about this critical Ukrainian town that fell, and administration officials have been warning for months and months that if U.S. funding runs out, that there are going to be detriment detrimental effects are on the battlefield for Ukrainian forces running out of ammunition, running out of important equipment. And that is what Ukraine is saying is happening already. And the President over the weekend did say that he was concerned that additional towns could end up falling if Congress doesn't take prompt action.

But of course, the political reality that he is grappling with right now, as we just heard him talk about is that there is a small faction of House Republicans that is not willing to take up this national security supplemental bill that does have some $60 billion in additional aid for Ukraine. Sara?

SINDER: MJ Lee asking the important questions there and getting some good answers. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Fred?

WHITFIELD: All right, Sara. Just moments ago, we learned that Alexei Navalny's body will not be returned to his family for another 14 days that according to a Navalny spokesperson. But Alexei Navalny's widow is now vowing to pick up his fight to bring change to Russia. Yulia Navalnaya, met with several E.U. foreign ministers this morning and before those meetings, she posted a new video online promising to find out how her husband was killed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

YULIA NAVALNAYA, ALEXEI NAVALNY'S WIDOW (through translator): In a cowardly way, they're hiding his body not showing to his mother not giving to his mother. They're lying and they're waiting for the traces of another of Putin's Novichok to disappear.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: CNN senior international correspondent Frederik Pleitgen joining us now. Fred, the Kremlin has said that an investigation is underway. What does that mean?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, well, that they say that this investigation is underway and that this investigation is open ended, that it's unclear what exactly the results of this investigation are going to be which it appears to me that if you take into account the spokesperson of Navalny's comments that apparently the body for at least the next 14 days is going to be under some sort of investigation. There might be some sort of autopsy or other tests that are going to happen.

Obviously, as we've heard there from Yulia Navalnaya herself, she does not believe in any of that. She does not believe that the Russian authorities are telling the truth. She was referring there to Novichok apparently wearing off that, of course, is a reference to the chemical nerve agent that not only Navalny's organization, but also internationally.

A lot of countries said that Alexei Navalny was poisoned with earlier a couple of years ago, where then he ended up in treatment where I am right now in Berlin. Of course, at this point in time, it's very difficult or impossible to say what exactly happened to Alexei Navalny. But what we can see there from his widow, from Yulia Navalnaya, is that she does not believe anything that the Russian authorities are saying, and certainly what we've been seeing over the weekend is Alexei Navalny's mother trying to get some sort of access, first of all, to the morgue, where they thought that the body was and then also to the forensics lab where they believe that some of these tests are being done so far to no avail.

All of this happening in the way north of Russia above the Arctic Circle, just to give an impression of how difficult it is for Alexei Navalny's organization and also for his family to get any sort of access. These are, of course, extremely remote parts of Russia where even communication can be quite difficult from those areas. So we heard there from Alexei Navalny's widow that they want to find out what exactly happened.

But I think one of the other things, Fredricka that you also said is also very telling and very important, and that is the fact that she is already meeting with E.U. leaders with E.U. foreign ministers trying to continue his work, which is what she has vowed to do, guys.

WHITFIELD: All right, Fred Pleitgen, thank you so much. Kate?

BOLDUAN: Joining me now to talk much more about this is Julia Ioffe, founding partner, Washington correspondent for Puck. Julia, it's good to see you. You were there at the Munich Conference when the news came out of that news came out and Alexei's wife, Yulia, made that remarkable appearance just after learning that her husband was dead. What do you make of what we're now hearing today from Yulia? She does -- she believes that Alexei was poisoned once again. Do you think the world will get a clearer answer?

JULIA IOFFE, FOUNDING PARTNER AND WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, PUCK: I don't think the world will get a clear answer. In fact, Alexei Navalny spoke about this in an interview after he had made a long way on his recovery from the first time he was poisoned with Novichok. And the interviewer asked him, you know, if you die, if you're -- if something happens to you, will we ever get an -- will we know what killed you? And he actually said, you know, this is what will happen if I die.

[11:10:09]

This -- the Kremlin is going to say was, you know, he died of some kind of cardiac failure. Everybody else is going to say this is very suspicious. They'll have rallies for me with people holding photographs and posters of my face on them. But we will never know what killed me. It will always be known as a suspicious death. He seemed to foretell it because, frankly, he knew the system so well. And I, you know, I think he's right.

BOLDUAN: The family being blocked from accessing his body, Putin spokesperson telling journalists this morning, in a call, we are not involved in this matter. And that means in returning his body, this is not the responsibility of the presidential administration. And now we're learning just in the last few minutes that they've said, the Kremlin has said they will not be releasing his body for 14 days. There's always a mind game element when it comes to a lot of what Vladimir Putin says at least. And I'm starting to wonder if there's a mind game element to this.

IOFFE: I think it's a pretty simple mind game. And then I can give your viewers the key to it right now. Basically, whatever the Kremlin says, be it Dmitry Peskov, Putin spokesperson, Putin, or any representative of the Kremlin all the way down to the prison authorities of the prison where Alexei Navalny was killed.

Whatever they say, it's opposite of the truth. That's it. So the other thing I would say is that when they say the body won't be released for another 14 days, it doesn't mean that the body will be released in 14 days, nor does it mean it will be released in any kind of state in which the family can use it to conduct an independent investigation.

I would not be surprised if, you know, after a month or two, the relatives get a box of what is said to be Navalny's ashes and whether they are or not, we won't know. But I think what's clearly happening is the state is trying to cover up what happened and trying to hide all evidence of this and make sure that we never know what happened. And in fact, we saw this when Navalny was poisoned with Novichok in August of 2020.

He investigated this himself with his team of investigators as well as with Christo Grozev that was on the CNN documentary, Navalny. The -- when he called the FSB agent who was one of the people responsible for poisoning him, he explained how -- what they did to cover up what they did. So I'm sure that that's exactly what's happening right now.

BOLDUAN: Just from context. Your deep knowledge and expertise in this area, you know, Alexei Navalny, you reminded everyone you posted and I took -- I was looking at it, you posted a photo of you and Alexei Navalny from back in 2012 when you were I believe it was right before you were leaving Russia.

Yulia said this morning, I will continue the work of Alexei Navalny. And also she urged, in her words, where I asked you to share with me in rage. You said this weekend that there's a feeling that hope has died this weekend for the opposition movement in Russia. Can Yulia carry this on?

IOFFE: Well, the other feeling that was voiced a lot this weekend, both at the Munich Security Conference and among oppositionally minded Russians was, can the opposition live, survive without Navalny? He was such a clear leader even when Boris Nemtsov was alive. He organized a really impressive organization nationwide before it was shut down and razed to the ground by the Kremlin.

Now that he is gone, I think the only person who could potentially carry on his legacy is his wife. What is so striking about her announcement this morning, in addition to the fact that it's only been three days since her -- since she learned of her husband's death, you can see in the video that she's clearly been crying for most of those three days.

And what's remarkable is the whole time, Navalny was entering politics for the last 15 or so years, Yulia was always at his side, but always staying out of the limelight. She was his supporter, she was his advisor, but she never wanted to steal the spotlight from him. He was the face of the movement. She -- in the very few interviews she gave, she was very press shy. She said, I don't want to be a politician myself, because when Alexei Navalny was poisoned in August of 2020 people said, could Yulia Navalnaya be the new leader of the opposition? She said, absolutely not. I want no part in this.

And so the fact that she has now affirmatively picked up the mantle and called then everybody to join her in the fight against the Kremlin is there a remarkable turnaround from where she has stood for the last 15 years.

[11:15:10]

BOLDUAN: Yes. It's great to see you Julia, thank you so much. Thank you.

IOFFE: Thank you.

BOLDUAN: Fred?

WHITFIELD: All right, Kate. The U.S. military says Houthi rebels are using unmanned underwater vessels in the Red Sea right now. Details on the U.S. strike to take one out and what it means for the escalating tensions.

Plus, new CNN reporting about the active role Kamala Harris is taking to reshape recampaigning messaging for 2024, why she is worried Biden could lose to the couch. And Donald Trump turns shoe salesman. Why he was talking these gold sneakers on the campaign trail?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:20:33]

SINDER: Vice President Kamala Harris is gearing up to head to Pittsburgh tomorrow as new CNN reporting this morning is highlighting her effort to get more involved in the reelection pitch. In a political version of put me in coach, more than two dozen sources are telling CNN, Harris has been gathering information to help her pierce what she sometimes refers to as the bubble of Biden campaign thinking. CNN senior reporter Isaac Dovere joins me now. Isaac, is Harris saying she's worried about where Biden is and losing to Donald Trump and that is why she is talking about this bubble?

EDWARD-ISAAC DOVERE, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Well, what she says, Sara, in these meetings is, she's not worried about Biden losing to Donald Trump, she's worried about him losing to the couch. What she means by that is that it does not seem like people are as enthusiastic and as supportive of Joe Biden, as they would need to be to turn out November give them the votes to be where they need to be to beat Trump in the quest for a second term here.

What she has been doing in meetings and conversations that she has been having on the side of events or inviting people over to the her residence at the Naval Observatory is trying to get some information from the ground that goes for a group of governors that she had at the Naval Observatory last weekend for a session there, or she's had meetings with several groups of black men leaders, people like D.L. Hughley and Don Cheadle, who were there for a Black Entertainment celebrity meeting in December or another one in January that was about political and finance leaders.

People like Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic Leader of the House, trying to say to them, what is not breaking through? What can we do to get better? How do we talk about things so that people feel more connected to the work of the Biden-Harris administration, and their to turn out when it comes to election time?

SINDER: Yes, there are some big names there on that roster. And there were some numbers showing in 2020, that the number of black men, although be it small went up for Donald Trump. So maybe that is also part of what she was looking at. Thank you so much, Isaac, for your reporting there. Fred?

WHITFIELD: All right, Sara, thank you. Well, Kamala Harris sets her sights on Michigan this week, Nikki Haley is going beast mode in South Carolina. This as she continues her self-dubbed beast of the southeast bus tour. She just got off the stage in Sumter, South Carolina just moments ago. And earlier, she was on "Fox News" with this prediction about how she'll match up against Donald Trump in her state.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) NIKKI HALEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think it's going to be close. I think it's going to be competitive. And we can't wait to go to Michigan the day after.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: All right with us now, CNN political commentators, S.E. Cupp and Republican strategist, Rina Shah. Good to see you both ladies. All right, Rina, you first, six days to go to the South Carolina primary and Nikki Haley is really in need of a win. If she doesn't pull off South Carolina, is Michigan even a factor?

RINA SHAH, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: It absolutely is a factor because South Carolina while it is her home state is a place where it would be a huge, huge morale boost that would give her that momentum that we often talk about. But it's not necessary. I am concerned about the delegate map. And I'm concerned about Super Tuesday.

So I'm one of the people saying that she should stay through Super Tuesday because as we know coast to coast, lots of races, some are winner takes all. But after that date, the way I see it, it becomes mathematically impossible for her to win the nomination in a very conventional way, of course. But here we are in this moment where it is looking dicey and her campaign recognizes that.

So I'm not surprised to hear her sort of really peel back the veneer sometimes of her of this very fancy, traditional conservative, she is starting to go for the jugular more. It remains yet to be seen whether that is going to be impactful. But again, there is a strong camp of folks including former Congresswoman Liz Cheney that believes like me, she should stay in through South Carolina, past South Carolina and into Super Tuesday to see what happens there.

WHITFIELD: All right, and S.E., you just heard Isaac Dovere's reporting Vice President Kamala Harris, you know, she's not worried about losing to Trump, instead, she's worried about losing to the couch, a similar sentiment shared by a radio host Charlamagne listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHARLAMAGNE THA GOD, HOST, SIRIUS XM, "THE BREAKFAST CLUB": The crooks that are Republicans, the cowards of the Democrats because they don't fight hard enough on anything. And you know, the couch is voter apathy. And you know that's who everybody is up against in 2024. And right now it feels like the couch is going to win.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[11:25:09]

WHITFIELD: All right, so S.E., you know, perhaps this isn't just a Democratic problem, do you think the couch is a big problem for the Republicans as well?

S.E. CUPP, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I mean, if we're looking at the two primary states that have voted Iowa, New Hampshire, that's not a factor. We've had really high turnout in both of those states. And I think while a lot of people are coming out to support Trump, because his base is pretty active. I mean, 40 plus percent of the Republican Party is coming out in support of someone other than Donald Trump. And Iowa was 49 percent voted for someone other than Donald Trump, and in New Hampshire was 40 percent voted for Nikki Haley. I talked to her campaign this morning.

And they made that exact point that the Republican Party is divided. It is not coalesced around Trump, despite sort of a media narrative that that it is and that he is inevitable. Rina is right. I think she's looking to stay in for the long haul. And as long as she is reaching that sort of 40 percent threshold, there are buyers for Nikki Haley. There are buyers and voters, there are buyers and donors. People want an alternative to Donald Trump, and she is giving them that alternative. And I think she's looking past South Carolina. I know that she's already in camping in Michigan. I think she wants to be sort of the last man standing here.

WHITFIELD: OK. And this morning, Donald Trump, I mean, he posted about Alexei Navalny's death. But you know, he has yet to condemn Navalny's death or be critical of Putin. But Trump did compare Navalny's death to his own political troubles. What's your reaction to that Rina?

SHAH: I find it nonsensical. It's another page out of Trump's playbook that looks to make himself the victim. This is a Republican Party that again, sort of traffics in fear. And what he's doing by picking up the Navalny note, is saying be fearful of what they're going to do to you if you're a dissident from somehow the Biden administration.

Look, he doesn't understand the communicating this way is entirely anti American, frankly. I mean, let's just call it what it is. This is a former president who's now hawking sneakers for money. You just got to look at the situation on its face. He's doing everything to save himself. So that means to get tidbit of news from over in Russia, even though he frequently calls people commies. It just doesn't add up. And most thinking Americans believe this.

They know the former President is trying to save himself. And he will pick up this narrative and continue forth with it for so long as he continues to get praised in places like South Carolina from sitting elected, like Senator Tim Scott and Congresswoman Nancy Mace who know better.

But again, this is a former president in trouble, in peril. And so you're going to see him, again, use the messaging that everybody thinks is fun to do these days in the Republican Party, which is cry victimhood. There's a very small segment that is still out here saying, we are not victims, we are Americans, and Donald Trump needs to recognize that.

WHITFIELD: And S.E. speaking of those sneakers, I mean, he did launch these gold sneakers, and they reportedly sold out within hours after, you know, he was hawking them. Your thoughts? I mean, is this about, you know, just appealing to people? I mean, he's all about branding. I mean, certainly that's not the kind of money it's going to -- that's going to help in, you know, his penalties court, $355 million court penalty.

CUPP: Yes. And that's just one, right? Look, Donald Trump has been grifting off of the backs of his own supporters, for years and years, lying to them. Remember, you know, the fundraising to stop the steal, he was asking his own supporters to give him money so he could stop the steal of, you know, his own election. We use that money to line his own pockets. Some of it went to Melania's makeup artists.

I mean, he is always using his supporters. Many of whom have, you know, gone to jail for Donald Trump because of January 6th. He doesn't care about his voters and his supporters. He just wants their money. He'll take the RNC's money to pay off his own legal bills. I mean, it's crass, it's gross, but it's a grift. And you have to wonder when Trump's words are going to realize that they're being used in this manipulative way.

WHITFIELD: All right, we'll leave it there for now. S.E. Cupp, Rina Shah, great to see you both. Thank you. Kate?

[11:29:43]

BOLDUAN: A U.S. drone has crashed in Yemen. And we have new reporting coming in now about the investigation underway to find out exactly why, that after a break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)