Return to Transcripts main page

CNN News Central

Nationwide protests in Israel after 6 hostages killed; Netanyahu insists Israel must control Philadelphi Corridor; 49ers player shot in broad daylight in San Francisco. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired September 02, 2024 - 14:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:02:01]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: From candidate to surrogate. President Biden returning to the campaign trail for the first time in a supporting role, appearing alongside Vice President Kamala Harris in a state that is critical for a victory on Election Day. Meanwhile, former President Trump is off the trail for a few days as his defense team prepares for a court hearing in his federal election interference case.

Plus, day long protests in Israel are spilling into nightfall after the bodies of six hostages killed by Hamas are found in Gaza. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu now vowing revenge. These major developing stories and many more all coming in right here at CNN News Central.

We're watching candidates sprint to Election Day right now. And on this Labor Day, Vice President Kamala Harris is focused on making her pitch to working class voters in critical battleground states. Moments ago, Harris wrapped up a campaign stop in Michigan, where she spoke alongside leaders and members of some of the largest unions in the country. Then later this afternoon, she heads to Pennsylvania, where President Biden will be joining her on the trail at a local union hall in Pittsburgh.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN HOST: And it will be their first official campaign event together since Biden dropped out of the race. And it also marks a new political phase for the President as we see him shift from candidate to surrogate.

Our correspondents join us now, beginning with CNN's Eva McKend, who is following the Harris campaign in Detroit. So, Eva, talk to us more about Harris's message today.

EVA MCKEND, CNN NATIONAL POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Pam, she joined with union workers and labor leaders to celebrate what she described as the dignity of work. She thanked unions for their contributions to this country. She noted that when union wages go up, everyone is wages go up. And she pledged, if elected, to expand the Affordable Care Act, to continue to fight, to bring the cost of prescription drugs down. And then most consequentially for this crowd, she said that she would fight to advance the PRO Act that would advance legal protections for employees, and as she tells it in union busting once and for all. Take a listen to this pro worker message. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES (D) AND U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The way we celebrate Labor Day is we know that hard work is good work. We know that when we organize, when we bring everyone together, it's a joyful moment where we are committed to doing the hard work of lifting up America's families.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCKEND: And Pam and Brianna, she also told this crowd to not pay attention to the polls, discount all of that. Yes, they are enjoying a lot of momentum at their back, but she still very much views herself as the underdog in this context.

KEILAR: Eva, President Biden, as we noted, will be joining Harris for this joint campaign event in Pittsburgh this afternoon. It's getting a lot of attention.

[14:05:00]

He is very popular in key parts in Pennsylvania. How is he trying to help?

MCKEND: Well, the campaign is deploying him where they think that he will be best. And we know that President Biden is very comfortable in union halls. This is a delicate dance for the Vice President because she is characterizing herself as a new way forward. And that is a tricky argument to make given that she is currently in the administration. But President Biden could prove to be an effective surrogate for her in the union halls. He's very, very comfortable with workers. They are comfortable with him. And so that is why he is going to be in Pittsburgh with her tonight. And then later on this week, while she is preparing for the debate, he will campaign in Wisconsin and Michigan as well. Brianna?

BROWN: All right. I also want to bring in CNN's Saenz live for us at the White House. So Arlette, talk to us a little bit more about Biden's role as top surrogate here for the Harris campaign. And just really, as we take a step back, how extraordinary it is, right? I mean, this was supposed to be his campaign.

KEILAR: That's right.

BROWN: He stepped aside. And now, it's Harris's campaign and he is a surrogate.

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah. And President Biden is now trying to figure out how to campaign in this entirely new reality is now he is no longer a candidate, but instead is expected to be a top surrogate for Vice President Kamala Harris. You will see the two of them together for the first time in a battleground state a bit later this afternoon. They will be appearing in Pittsburgh. Perhaps, there is no other city on Labor Day that is more important to Joe Biden than Pittsburgh. It's somewhere that he has returned time and time again, 2015, 2018 for Labor Day to make his pitch to union workers and working class voters. That is a key constituency that Harris's advisors believe Biden could help with going forward. You're also going to see President Biden not just spend a lot of time in Pennsylvania, but also other critical blue wall states like Michigan and Wisconsin.

The President will be attending a pair of White House official events there a bit later in the week, trying to promote some of the popular agenda items that have resonated with communities in those areas. That is one way that advisors believe Biden can be used to go out and talk about popular agenda items that he and Harris achieved together, things like lowering the cost of prescription drugs, also bringing back manufacturing jobs to the U.S.

And it all comes as the Biden -- as the Harris campaign, and the White House and the Vice President's Office are all in close consultation about how they can deploy Biden going forward. It's expected that he will largely try to speak to groups where he enjoyed success with in the past. That includes working class, blue collar voters, as well as older voters, which Biden had been doing quite well with in the polls when he was running in 2024, just in the last year.

But certainly for Biden, this marks a new phase in his candidacy or in his presidency, as he's also trying to burnish his own legacy. And so much of what the President is trying to do here, not just at the White House, but also the campaign trail, is trying to elect Vice President Harris as the next president, as he believes that will be a critical part of his legacy as well.

BROWN: All right. ARLETTE SAENZ live for us from the White House. Thanks so much. Well, former President Donald Trump is off the trail today. But in a new Labor Day message on social media, he claims that many Americans are, quote, "suffering during this holiday weekend under the Biden administration."

CNN economics and political commentator Catherine Rampell is here with us. So Catherine, when you look at both candidates, where do each of them stand when it comes to union rights and labor issues?

CATHERINE RAMPELL, CNN ECONOMICS AND POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: If you look at their actual records as well as the things that they have said publicly, there is no contest. Kamala Harris is much more pro-union and generally pro-labor than Donald Trump has been. Again, these are on the policies. So for example, if you look at Kamala Harris's record, what she has stood for, she supported the PRO Act, which is a bill that would make it easier for unions to organize, essentially.

She has also supported a higher minimum wage. She and her running mate, Tim Walz, have supported various kinds of expansions of paid leave, Tim Walz actually implemented, paid sick leave and paid parental leave, at least for government workers in the state that he is the governor of Minnesota. So there are a number of kinds of policies. So OSHA is also on that list. OSHA, of course, is the agency that does inspections for workplace safety, as well as putting in place more safety regulations.

Donald Trump, on the other hand, he's been a little bit cagier about what he supports. For example, it's unclear where he stands on the minimum wage. He's held multiple positions over the years. But if you look at his actual actions, many of his concrete actions have been against organized labor or against workers, things like he signed a couple of executive orders intending to gut the U.S. federal civil service and erase civil service protections.

[14:10:12]

He has -- he appointed members to the NLRB, the National Labor Relations Board, that essentially made it harder to have speedy union elections. He praised Elon Musk, of course, for firing workers who had spoken out about workplace safety issues and tried to unionize. And he cut funding or attempted to cut funding for OSHA, but was unsuccessful. So that's, again, on the policies. You know, that doesn't necessarily mean that rank and file union workers are flocking to Harris uniformly.

BROWN: Right. And you had the Teamsters president, another big union, say, look, rank and file is really divided as it comes to their politics, Democrats, Republican. He said he's waiting to formally endorse a candidate until its members have a chance to meet with Harris. Historically, though, Teamsters have, you know, has endorsed Democrats. Talk to us a little bit more about union endorsements at this moment, too, when support for unions among the public is really on the rise.

RAMPELL: Even for the UAW, for example, it took their leadership a very long time to formally endorse Joe Biden until well after he had already walked the picket line with striking UAW workers. So the leadership has mostly come around to endorsing Democrats, including in that example, not so much yet anyway in the Teamsters case. But just because the leadership is in favor of the Democratic ticket, as it has been, as you point out, generally for many decades, that doesn't necessarily mean that their members are following along.

Members are obviously looking at policy issues. But there's also sort of a more culture war affect-related piece of all of this as well. Democrats have increasingly become identified with higher education, more elite voters and their interests, even if they also support many of these very pro-union policies that I was just mentioning. Republicans have tried to claim the mantle of populism of the working class man, blue collar workers, men and women for that matter. And so many of the rank and file workers are still gravitating towards Donald Trump, even if Kamala Harris's policies would probably be better for their pocket book.

BROWN: All right. Catherine Rampell, thank you so much.

KEILAR: Trump will be hitting the campaign trail later this week with a stop in the swing state of Wisconsin while his defense team is preparing for a court hearing in his federal election interference case. CNN National Correspondent Kristen Holmes joins us now. So, Kristen, Trump is raising some eyebrows here with this bold new claim about that case against him. It's similar rhetoric from what we've heard in the past, but something key is missing from it. KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, Donald Trump often

talks about the fact that he believes he shouldn't have been charged in the January 6th case, in the election interference case, because of the fact that he had every right to question the election. Obviously, that's not what he's being accused of. He is being accused of trying to interfere with the election. He went a step further during this interview and lacked that keyword of what he was being accused of. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES (R) AND CURRENT U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's so crazy that my poll numbers go up. Whoever heard you get indicted for interfering with a presidential election where you have every right to do it, you get indicted and your poll numbers go up.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: So he says, he was indicted for interfering with the election and then goes on to say, which he had every right to do, lacking that word of I being accused of interfering with the election and taking out the part where he says that he has every right to question the election, not interfere with the election. Now, we've spoken to some legal experts who say they don't know that this is going to deeply impact the case in any way. But we also know that Donald Trump's team, both campaign and legal, has been trying to get on the same page with messaging. And that includes with their client and candidate. Obviously, these are not things they want to deal with as they head into this very competitive election cycle.

KEILAR: What's their explanation for it?

HOLMES: They say this is exactly what he said before, essentially that he just missed the words that he has said before, that he was trying to say the exact same thing, that he has been accused of interfering with the election. But of course, he does have every right to question the election. That's part of it. But he just didn't say that part during the interview.

KEILAR: Curious why. Kristen Holmes, thank you so much for the reporting. We appreciate it. We do have some breaking news and this is very sad. Four people have died in a shooting on a Chicago subway train. Officials say that these victims were all passengers on the train this morning as it was making its way into Forest Park just west of the city. Investigators say, one person is in custody and they believe this was an isolated incident. We're going to be getting more information on this. Hopefully, we'll bring that to you as we do get it.

And ahead this hour on CNN News Central, Prime Minister Netanyahu says Hamas will pay a heavy price after Israeli forces found the bodies of six hostages killed in Gaza.

[14:15:10] They say they were killed a short time before the IDF made their way into the tunnels where their bodies were found. And we're following nationwide protests in Israel where demonstrators are now demanding a ceasefire.

BROWN: Plus, a San Francisco 49ers player is shot in broad daylight on a downtown street. The apparent victim of a robbery gone wrong. The latest on Ricky Pearsall's condition and the teenager accused of shooting him. And Disney pulls ABC and ESPN from DirecTV rights as football season gets underway. What we know about this broadcast battle.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:20:25]

KEILAR: We're following breaking news out of Israel where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is asking for forgiveness, or he said he asked forgiveness from families whose family members died as hostages in Gaza. And he's also vowing to punish Hamas after the bodies of those six hostages were recovered from the Gaza Strip. He spoke moments ago as another day of mass protests and a general labor strike intensify the pressure on Netanyahu to finally get a hostage deal done.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU (Through Translator): Israel is not going to ignore this massacre. The Hamas will pay a heavy price for this, a very heavy price in the war against the evil axis in this specific war against Hamas.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Now, before Netanyahu spoke to his grieving country, President Biden accused the Prime Minister of not doing enough to secure a ceasefire deal as he arrived at the White House to meet with his hostage negotiating team.

Back in Israel, mourners gathered for the funeral of slain Israeli- American hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin. The 23-year-old was among those expected to be released in the first phase of a ceasefire deal, according to U.S. and Israeli officials. CNN's Nic Robertson is joining us now from Tel Aviv. Nic, how is the crowd reacting to Netanyahu's remarks after what has just been such an incredibly sad few days?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: You know, I think it's going to be hard for a lot of people to take this very rare act of contrition by the Prime Minister to take it at face value. He spent the vast majority of this press conference, you know, stepping away from his lectern, picking up a pointer and trying to sort of explain on a map of Gaza why he refuses to change his sticking point on keeping troops along the border between Gaza and Egypt, the so called Philadelphi Corridor. He spent a huge amount of time with graphics showing how Hamas was using that border tunnels under it to bring weapons into Israel and -- weapons into Gaza rather. And unless troops remain along there, he said that Hamas will do that again.

So this was the Prime Minister on one hand, offering some solace to those families. But the real solace that the families are looking for, that the people on the streets here are looking for is a change of fundamental position. And he offered up the exact opposite. He offered up a doubling down of his current position. So I don't think this is going to take people off the streets by any means. It will give them a renewed vigor to maintain that calls for him to either step down, have an election, or at least get the hostages back.

KEILAR: All right. We'll be watching. I mean, these hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets just give you a sense of what pressure he is facing from the public there in Israel. Nic, thank you for that live report from Tel Aviv. Pamela?

BROWN: Let's talk more about these developments with retired Air Force Colonel Cedric Leighton. He is a CNN Military Analyst. Great to see you. So as we just heard it laid out there, you know, Netanyahu today vowing to punish Hamas for what they did to the hostages. From a military standpoint, what would that look like beyond what we're already seeing from Israel?

CEDRIC LEIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yeah, Pamela, it's hard to really see if there's any difference. And as Nic was pointing out in his report, there is really very little difference from what the Israelis have done before and what the Prime Minister outlined in the speech just now. He did make a strong case for keeping Israeli presence and israeli presence in the Philadelphi Corridor. That's the area between Gaza and Egypt, that border area. And basically, what he was saying is let's keep this area under Israeli control so that no weapons, no money, no munitions, no people can go back and forth. Those are valid military points.

However, the other point, the other military point that is really in contrast to this, is that if you don't move out of the Philadelphi Corridor at least temporarily, then there's probably no way that there's going to be a peace agreement or a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas.

BROWN: And I think that's key because this has really been the sticking point, right, of a potential deal, a ceasefire deal and a return of the hostages. And so you heard in the wake of these six hostages being killed, Netanyahu is defending his position, doubling down on why that corridors are important.

[14:25:00]

And President Biden just saying today that Netanyahu isn't doing enough to bring a ceasefire deal across the finish line. How might a comment like that impact ceasefire talks?

LEIGHTON: It could certainly force the Israelis into a more hardened position, but it could also, on the other hand, pressure them to listen to their position. But with the Prime Minister's speech right now, it does seem that the Israelis, at least the top level of the Israeli government, is going in for a much more hard position in this particular case. Hamas has basically said that they're not going to do a deal unless the Israelis leave. The Israeli military and the intelligence services have said that they can control the Philadelphia border enough, even without troops being present, that they would be willing to take the risk to allow Israeli troops to leave in order to get the hostages back.

So basically what Netanyahu is doing is he's going against his senior military and intelligence advisors, and that is really where the big impasse within the Israeli government lies. And that will have a huge impact on the negotiations.

BROWN: So tactically then, tell us a little bit more about this position from Netanyahu, his insistence of keeping these troops in the Philadelphi Corridor during these ceasefire talks. Tell us a little bit more about why he thinks that is so important.

LEIGHTON: So what he sees is that this is the major root in for all kinds of weapons to come in. And this is how Iran, using various intermediaries that go through Egypt with the Egyptian authorities, in some cases, turning a blind eye toward the transaction. The Iran and other suppliers of weapons can provide weapons through the Philadelphi Corridor, through those tunnels into Gaza. So this is a very well- organized effort on the part of Hamas and in essence, its co- conspirators, if you will. And that really makes for a difficult situation for the Israeli military, for the IDF.

And from a tactical perspective, what Netanyahu is afraid of is that this will continue to be a place in which all these arms flow through this area without any real control by the Israelis or by anybody else. And he doesn't think that not having boots on the ground, in essence, will stop this flow of weapons and personnel as well as money.

BROWN: Do you think a ceasefire deal is the best option right now to save the lives of the remaining hostages?

LEIGHTON: Well, I don't know how realistic a ceasefire deal is right now, Pamela, but I think it is the best option because the way in which Hamas is holding these hostages seems to be in a very tightly controlled area. And because of that, it's really difficult for the Israeli forces to mount hostage rescue operations at this particular moment in time. And of course, as we saw with the deaths of the six hostages just recently, that creates the real problem here. The hostages are basically pawns in all of this. And unfortunately, if the ceasefire deal is not reached, then their lives are -- continue to be at risk at this point.

BROWN: All right. Colonel Cedric Leighton, thank you. And still ahead, San Francisco's crime rate gets more national attention as a 49ers player is shot in broad daylight. And a teenager is accused of pulling the trigger.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)