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Biden Preps for Debate; Three Days till Presidential Debate; Russia Terror Attacks; Texas Woman Charged with Attempted Murder. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired June 24, 2024 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Explaining your incredible time in space. And we hope everything goes off properly.

All right, a new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Brand new reporting on the preps for the CNN debate. Donald Trump's advisers were allegedly telling him to be disciplined. And now Biden campaign sources say President Biden is preparing for multiple versions of Donald Trump.

Nineteen people killed, dozen injured in terror attacks targeting churches and synagogues. We've got new details on who is being blamed.

And a three-year-old girl, the target of a possible hate crime. Police say a woman tried I drown the toddler because she is Muslim.

Kate is out. I'm John Berman, with Sara Sidner. And this is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

SIDNER: The stakes, incredibly high. The countdown is on as President Biden and Donald Trump prepare for their first debate face off in nearly four years. It comes as the Biden administration marks the second anniversary of the Supreme Court overturning Roe versus Wade with this new campaign ad, putting the blame squarely on Donald Trump for the state of reproductive rights in this country.

And this morning we've learned the Biden campaign, as you heard John say, preparing to face two different people, a very disciplined version of Donald Trump on the debate stage perhaps on Thursday. Trump, meanwhile, holding what his team is calling policy discussions with allies. And the Trump campaign has recently taken a step back from questioning the president's cognitive capacities.

CNN's Arlette Saenz and Alayna Treene are joining us now to discuss this.

Arlette, I'm going to begin with you.

What's the Biden campaign doing exactly to prepare for what they're calling a disciplined, potentially Donald Trump on the stage? ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Sara, President Biden remains at Camp David where he has hunkered down for a few days with his senior advisers to prepare for his first in-person showdown with Trump since those 2020 debates. And campaign advisers say that the president is preparing for all scenarios of the different types of Trump that could appear on the debate stage, with one senior adviser saying there's a real possibility there could be a disciplined Trump at - in that Atlanta studio as they prepare to debate on Thursday.

Now, Biden is well aware of a lot of Trump's tactics when it comes to debating, having been there in the room with him in 2022 two times with that first debate being quite contentious and chaotic. So, part of the president's focus heading into Thursday is preparing for all of the scenarios.

But the Biden campaign is also using today to engage in an all-out push to warn that abortion rights remained under attack in this country. This - today marks the second anniversary of the Supreme Court's ruling in the Dobbs case, which overturned Roe versus Wade. And in a few hours, Vice President Kamala Harris will hit the trail in Maryland, as well as Arizona, to warn of some of the stakes.

In an interview that aired this morning, she talked about many of the states that I've placed abortion bans in their state, including some that do not include any exceptions for those survivors of rape and incest.

Take a listen to the vice president's warning earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Think about what these extremist are saying to a survivor of a crime of violence to their body, a survivor of a crime that is a violation of their body. And to say to that survivor, and you have no right or authority to make a decision about what happens to your body next, that's immoral.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: The Biden campaign today is also out with a stark new ad featuring a personal testimonial from a Louisiana woman who says she was impacted by her state's abortion ban. This woman, Kaitlyn Joshua, details her experience and blames former President Donald Trump.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAITLYN JOSHUA: The pain that I was feeling was excruciating. And I was turned away from two emergency rooms. That was a direct result of Donald Trump overturning Roe v. Wade.

He's now a convicted felon. Trump thinks he should not be held accountable for his own criminal actions, but he will let women and doctors be punished.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: This ad is also interesting because it marks the second time that the Biden campaign is using Trump's criminal convictions in its advertising, showing how they're trying to tie it to some other politically potent issues.

Now, Biden's campaign advisers have long believed that abortion rights will be a key issue heading into November's election, hoping that it will galvanize women voters, as well as independent voters. Democrats, of course, saw some success around abortion rights in the 2022 midterms. That is something the Biden campaign is hoping to replicate in November. And it's certain that President Biden will try to draw this contrast with Trump on abortion in Thursday's debate on CNN.

[09:05:07]

SIDNER: All right, thank you to you.

I'm going to go to Alayna now.

We're seeing a difference in how Trump and his surrogates have been talking about President Biden. They've been calling him feeble and, you know, mentally unfit. But all of a sudden we're seeing a change. What's going on?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN REPORTER: Well, look, Sara, they're trying to manage expectations. And you're absolutely right, for months now Donald Trump himself, but also his team, have mocked Joe Biden's mental and physical fitness. They've tried to paint him as a senile candidate. Someone who they would argue couldn't even stand on stage for the 90 minutes allotted for this debate.

Now we're seeing them change their tune. And Donald Trump himself really - even himself last week in an - in a podcast interview argued that he thinks that Joe Biden is a worthy debater. We saw several of his vice presidential contenders, including North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum on Sunday argue that perhaps Biden will be up to the challenge.

This is all them trying to raise the bar for Joe Biden. The problem with their criticisms of Joe Biden's mental and physical fitness is that it was - they're setting a low bar for him on the debate stage. And so we're kind of seeing them try to change that rhetoric and tell America that this is going to be a worthy fight between the two.

Now, I also just want to draw your attention to some comments we heard Donald Trump make over the weekend when he was in Philadelphia for a political rally. He was talking about his anticipated announcement on who was going to be his running mate.

Take a listen to what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have you decided who your vice president is?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Pick Tulsi. DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT AND 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: In my mind, yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do they know?

TRUMP: No. Nobody knows.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's right.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tim Scott.

(CROSS TALK)

TRUMP: Who do you like as VP?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TREENE: Now, Sara, there's so much speculation right now and a lot of anticipation over who Donald Trump is going to ultimately select. And this is the language we've heard Donald Trump stay for a while. He often says that he knows who his choice is going to be. However, from my conversations with Donald Trump's team, they're still not completely - or they haven't come to a formal decision yet on who he is going to select as his running mate.

What I do know is that he has really narrowed his list of three top contenders. That is Doug Burgum, JD Vance, and Marco Rubio. All people that they believe currently are at the top of his list. But, of course, this is Donald Trump we're talking about. Whenever we try to predict who a candidate will pick for VP, it's always a difficult task. It's even harder with Donald Trump. And again, when I talk to his team, they say he is someone who changes his mind every day based on who he sees on TV, who he speaks with over the phone. And so until he formerly makes his announcement, Donald Trump can change as mind up until the last minute.

SIDNER: We will know when it is announced.

Thank you so much, Alayna Treene and Arlette Saenz there from the White House.

And join CNN as President Biden and former President Trump meet for the first debate. An historic one of the 2024 election. Jake Tapper and Dana Bash moderating. It's all live from Atlanta Thursday beginning 9:00 p.m. Eastern.

John.

BERMAN: All right, with us now, CNN political analyst Bakari Sellers and former senior adviser for the Trump 2016 campaign, Jason Osborne.

Bakari, first to you.

We have this brand new reporting that Donald Trump's team is telling him maybe they should - he should go out and be more disciplined in this debate. Let Joe Biden, President Biden, talk. You buy it? BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I do buy it. I do buy it, if that's what Jason Miller, who is a noble advisor, is telling him, as well as Susie (ph). I know that he has a great team around him, which is kind of contrary to what people would imagine being around Donald Trump or in his orbit, but he has a really good campaign team. And I'm sure the advice they're giving him is to be disciplined, stay on message and be brief and then allow Joe Biden to talk.

Now, the problem with that is Donald Trump. He is somebody who has never proven to been - be disciplined and does not stay on message. And if I were advising Joe Biden, I would ask him to, at certain points in time, particularly early on within the first 30 minutes, do what you can do to get under Donald Trump's skin. Referred to him as a convicted felon. Make a - make a joke and say, you know, when you went through those 32, 33, I can't recall how many guilty vote - verdicts were there, Mr. Trump? Say things like that to get him riled up, to get him off his game. And I think you'll be able to see Donald Trump unravel easily. He's not the most disciplined, although his campaign team this year is actually very good.

BERMAN: Jason, since Bakari began the PG role playing here, if President Biden does do that on the stage, how do you think that Donald Trump will respond?

JASON OSBORNE, FORMER SENIOR ADVISER, TRUMP 2016 CAMPAIGN: Well, you know, there's one thing I've noticed about Donald Trump over the last eight years is that there is - there are two Donald Trumps when it comes to speaking to a camera. There's the crowd that invigorates him, that he tests messages off of them and he feeds off of that energy. And when he's in - in a private setting or a more private setting without a studio audience, there's a different Donald Trump.

[09:10:05]

I mean I think it gets a little bit more serious. Although I completely agree with what Bakari is saying. I think the message from the campaign is, you're in a different environment. You need to speak more coherently and stay on message and really kind of zing at Joe Biden and counter punch him on some of the attacks that he makes on - on Donald Trump.

And so I think in this case what you're going to see is you're going to see an attempt to try and get some of those one-liners that Donald Trump is infamous for. And I think they're going to fall flat and he's going to feel that and he's going to pivot and try and be a little bit more serious, I guess, in this debate.

BERMAN: Coherent. Be more coherent. Does he have coherent policy or how would - do you think he will convey coherent policy on issues like Social Security? I was trying to talk to Congressman Byron Donalds about Social Security before because Donalds has supported privatizing Social Security. I was curious if that came up in conversation with Donald Trump.

If there was a conversation about Social Security, Jason, do you expect the former president to be able to articulate a well-thought- out position?

OSBORNE: You know, I think Donald Trump is one of those that he speaks in, you know, five-second clips, 10-second clips. And I don't see Donald Trump actually wading into the weeds on policy. But I don't think he necessarily needs to. I think if he hits the top line message points, then I think he's going to get his message across.

And I don't know if you're - if anybody is really expecting either of these candidates to really dive into the weeds on policy. I think during the debate and then after is when the campaigns come out and say this is what the plan is, or theoretically that's what they're supposed to do. Whether or not that actually is the case on the Trump side is - remains to be seen.

BERMAN: Bakari, what makes you nervous?

SELLERS: Oh, when my wife yells at me when I'm coming home from work and not really - I'm unsure what she's mad about on this particular day is really when I - when I get nervous.

BERMAN: How about for the debate? Because if that happens on Thursday -

SELLERS: Oh.

BERMAN: You know, you'll have like many things to worry about.

SELLERS: I thought you asked a personal question, Berman.

BERMAN: It's all good.

SELLERS: I thought you were just asking me personal questions.

BERMAN: It's all good. We'll take that offline. For the debate, what makes you nervous?

SELLERS: Nothing - nothing -- nothing makes me nervous about the debate.

BERMAN: Nothing?

SELLERS: No. I mean, look, I don't think the needle's going to move for any candidate in one way or another. I think that the cake is pretty baked. I think this is a geo-TV (ph) race and I think Joe Biden will - will perform extremely well, which means he'll clear the low expectations set by the Trump campaign.

I think that - that Donald Trump will utilize this moment. The only thing - I guess that - this makes me nervous, but - but not really. The only thing that can blow everything that Jason and I are talking about and change the complete trajectory of this race is if there's a Supreme Court ruling on Thursday that says that the president is immune from prosecution. I think that would provide him with a great deal of confidence. It would buoy the former president. And it will give Joe Biden something he has to deal with at that late hour in preparation for debate. BERMAN: Jason, I don't know if you are concerned about getting a phone call from a loved one. But aside from that, what would you be nervous about for this debate Thursday night?

OSBORNE: Well, I agree 100 percent with what Bakari said on the thing that makes him nervous. The same with me.

I think, in terms of this debate, I think what you're going to see is, you know, if Donald - if Joe Biden has any of his kind of freezing moments, and I know a lot of those have been like overemphasized, but I do think that Donald Trump may capitalize on some of that. And that a little bit makes me nervous on how it is presented across and how Donald Trump tries to really kind of attack that aspect of Joe Biden because I think that's going to affect him with the swing voters.

BERMAN: Look, we'll see.

One thing I will say is, we - this is - we've never seen anything like this before, a debate this early. So, I think that everything we've learned in politics, we may need to throw out because we just don't know whether everything is baked into the cake. We've never had this kind of cake before, Bakari, so we're going to have to wait and see what happens Thursday night.

SELLERS: True.

BERMAN: Bakari Sellers, Jason Osborn, great to see both of you. Thank you.

Sara.

OSBORNE: Thank you.

SIDNER: All right, this morning, new details after 15 law enforcement officers and an orthodox priest are killed during a terror attack in Russia. What we know about the suspects.

The judge in Donald Trump's classified documents case takes on two key issues today. How Trump's legal team will try to get all of his charges dropped.

And an incredible story of survival. What would you think about if you were stranded in the woods for ten days?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LUKAS MCCLISH: I want a burrito and a taco bowl. That's what I thought about every day when I - after the first five days when I started to like kind of realize that I might be over my head.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:19:25] SIDNER: Authorities in Russia's Dagestan region have declared three days of mourning following attack Sunday on churches and synagogues. At least 15 police officers and four civilians, including a priest, were killed in a coordinated series of attacks in the cities of Derbent and Makhachkala. The total number of victims remains unclear at this hour. An ISIS affiliate, though, has come forward praising the attacks on social media, but so far no group has claimed responsibility.

CNN's Clare Sebastian is in London with more on this story.

What are Russian authorities saying about who they think may be to blame for this?

[09:20:02]

CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we haven't had any clear signals from Russian authorities. There's been a few rumblings. Law enforcement agencies telling state media on Sunday evening that they thought that this was adherence to foreign Islamist terror organizations. We then heard from another Russia member of parliament for Dagestan saying that he thought that the security services of Ukraine and NATO were behind this. Obviously, I think we should take that with a pinch of salt.

What we do have now, it's not a claim of responsibility, not even close, but we do have one of the telegram channels used by the Islamic State Khorasan Province, ISIS-K, praising this attack, praising the shootings. But as I said, not claiming responsibility.

Significant though because ISIS-K did claim responsibility for that very deadly terror attack back in March at the Crocus City concert hall in Moscow. But we don't know as of yet. We also don't know if authorities have caught or killed all of those responsible. They have said that five militants were killed during the counterterror operation, but efforts are ongoing we think to find more accomplices.

What we do know though is that they believed that these were very coordinated, ambitious attacks taking place in these two cities more than 80 or so miles apart. And that clearly there's a pattern in that these houses of worship were specifically targeted, churches, synagogues.

All of this coming when Dagestan, which is a predominantly Muslim region, is seeing increased tensions on top of what we've already seen as decades of sporadic violence, Russian efforts to put down a sort of ongoing Islamic insurgency there. All of this has been found by the war in Ukraine. This region has seen a sort of disproportionate level of mobilization. And then more recently by the war in Gaza there's a Jewish population as well in this region, and we did see an anti- Jewish mob storm the airport in Makhachkala back in October. A very scary scenes there as well.

So, the fact that synagogues targeted here, raising questions about this interethnic tension on top of obviously the security questions that the Russian state is now going to face. SIDNER: I'm curious how likely it is that Russian citizens start asking question. You had these two terror attacks that you mentioned. And questioning Putin's priorities as it's so been focused on the war with Ukraine.

SEBASTIAN: Yes, look, it's a good question. I think there's some nuance here. Obviously, state media will not overtly question the sort of credibility of the president around this. But while we did see one Russian member of parliament saying that this was, you know, the work of NATO and Ukraine, another MP came out and said, look, we need to deal with our own backyard first. It's not helpful to be - to be shifting the blame onto others.

So, I think there are those looking at the fact that the Crocus City concert hall was the deadliest terror attack in Russia in two decades. This happening almost three months to the day after that is going to raise questions around security in the country as so many resources are being piled into the war in Ukraine, Sara.

SIDNER: Clare Sebastian, thank you for your reporting there.

John.

BERMAN: All right, this morning, growing calls for a hate-crime investigation to be opened after a woman in Texas allegedly tried to drown a three-year-old Muslim girl. This is the scene where it happened. The woman has now been charged with attempted capital murder.

CNN's Rosa Flores is with us with the latest.

Rosa, what are you learning?

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we're learning some of the disturbing details, John, and some of those intense moments in which this mother was simply trying to save her children.

Let me take you through this. This happened in Euless, Texas, which is between Fort Worth and Dallas. And according to the Euless Police Department, the suspect has been identified as Elizabeth Wolf. She's 42-years-old. And she has been charged with attempted capital murder and injury to a child.

Now, according to CAIR, a Muslim mom was simply by the pool at her apartment complex with her two children, ages three and six, when reportedly Wolf approached her, started making racist remarks and threats. Now, police were called. Police eventually arrived on the scene. And they talked to witnesses. And police say that Wolf was intoxicated and that she tried to drown this woman's three-year-old child.

Here's what police said. Quote, "the mother began helping her son when Wolf grabbed her three-year-old daughter and forced her underwater. The mother was able to pull her daughter from the water. Her daughter had been yelling for help and was coughing up water."

Now, CAIR is asking law enforcement and authorities who are investigating this to look at this case as a hate crime.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MUSTAFAA CARROLL, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CAIR-TEXAS: According to the mother, the six-year-olds son was able to escape, but her petite three-year-old daughter was unable.

The alleged attacker snatched off the mother's head scarf and used it to beat the mother with, as well as kicking her to keep her away from forcing her child's head underwater.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[09:25:08]

FLORES: Now, paramedics responded to the scene, and according to police, the two children were evaluated and were OK.

But, John, the backdrop of all of this, of course, is an increase in hate in America and an increase in attacks against both Muslims and Jews.

Back to you.

BERMAN: Incredibly disturbing allegations there.

Rosa Flores, thank you for that.

All right, we have new video which shows just how quickly floodwater is swapping parts of the Midwest. Now some of these areas are dealing with dangerous heat as they try to recover.

And Justin Timberlake speaking for the first time since his DWI arrest.

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