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Florida Surgeon General Defends Ending Vaccine Mandates; Baltimore Mayor Pushes Back On Trump's National Guard Threat; Trump Signals He's Ready To Hit Russia With More Sanctions. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired September 08, 2025 - 08:30   ET

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

[08:30:02]

HARRY ENTEN, CNN CHIEF DATA ANALYST: I do see something of a pattern.

Sometimes we lose the forest for the trees, but I want to look at the forest. And it is one ugly duckling forest that we're looking at for Donald Trump.

You know, look at this -- negative net approval rating for something. You know, we talk about one poll, the CBS News poll. We talk about another poll, the NBC News poll.

No. Look at the aggregate polls and look how long Donald Trump's net approval rating has been negative. It has been every day since March 12th in the average of polls. We\re talking about 181 days in a row in which Donald Trump has been underwater swimming with the fishes.

There is no good data for Donald Trump when looking at the aggregate. And looking overall, he has been negative for a very long period of time, the vast majority of his second presidency.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: What about the issues?

ENTEN: Okay. What about the issues? You see this here, right? Is there any shining light? Is there any light at the end of the tunnel? Well, look at the issues. Look at this. These are all the key issues.

Donald Trump is underwater on all of them. Trade, obviously, tariffs have been a big thing at the bottom of your list, minus 17 points. The economy, which was the reason -- the reason he was elected to a second term to fix the economy, way underwater at minus 14 points. Foreign policy, minus 12.

And then I think, Mr. John Berman, the key two issues at the top, because these have been Donald Trump's strongest issues, crime and immigration. But get this, he is now underwater on both of these issues, if barely. But he's underwater on crime at minus two, immigration at minus three.

On all the key issues, he is again swimming with the fishes -- consistency across the board.

BERMAN: It is interesting though because the difference here does explain why, even with these jobs numbers, which were historically bad --

ENTEN: Yes.

BERMAN: -- on Friday, this is what he's focused on today. Hed rather be talking about this than this.

ENTEN: Absolutely. All right. What about with key groups that may have influenced his election victory?

BERMAN: Okay. So, you know, we talked about right at the top that every day since March 12th, what has changed since February in terms of making Donald Trump go from the positive side of the ledger to the negative side of the ledger.

And this, of course, I think is so important, two key groups that were so important to getting Donald Trump a second term, he did so much better than the traditional Republican among those under the age of 30, and Hispanics.

Look at this -- in February, among those under the age of 30, his net approval rating, according to CBS News, plus two points. Look at where we are now, negative 30 points. That's a 32 point move in the wrong direction.

And Hispanics, he was six points underwater. Look at this, minus 34 points. That's a 28-point move since February.

No wonder Donald Trump is in trouble. He's steady across the board. And since February, when he was last positive, he's only gotten significantly worse among two very key groups for his election back last year.

BERMAN: If this sticks, it will be interesting to see how it impacts some of these districts, especially Texas, in the midterms.

ENTEN: I got a feeling we'll be talking more about that down the line.

BERMAN: Harry, and thank you very much.

Kate?

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: So, Florida's top health official defending now his and the state's controversial move to push to eliminate all longstanding vaccine requirements, including for children to attend school.

Florida's surgeon general, Dr. Joseph Ladapo, is now telling CNN that the decision that they announced last week was not based on actual data that they would have gathered, but rather on what he called ethics and personal freedom. Personal based on personal choice.

When pressed about whether the state had commissioned any medical research or analysis of the impact of this move, the surgeon general said this:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. JOSEPH LADAPO, FLORIDA SURGEON GENERAL: We don't need to do any projections. We handle outbreaks all the time. So there's nothing special that -- that we would need to do. And secondly, again, there are countries that don't have vaccine mandates, and the sky isn't falling over there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Joining us right now to talk about this is the president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Dr. Susan Kressly.

Doctor, thank you for being here.

Just, first and foremost, responding to the take from the surgeon general. There are a few aspects of this I want to get to, but first and foremost, him saying that there's no analysis that's needed because outbreaks will happen and they always do. What's the response from the academy on this?

DR. SUSAN KRESSLY, PRESIDENT, AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PEDIATRICS: So, you cannot claim to put child health first without fully understanding how many children would be at risk, how many children could be harmed, and how many children could die.

Failure to conduct that analysis is unethical, and anyone prioritizing child health understands that you must do deep research, and a lot of analysis because children can't do it alone, and families depend on leaders to guide them in those decisions.

BOLDUAN: And what he says he is basing this decision on is not medical analysis, but on the idea of personal choice and personal freedom. And speaking in -- speaking to Jake Tapper, he says there's this conflation of the science and what is the right and wrong thing to do, Doctor.

KRESSLY: So, let's start with the fact that individual choices have communitywide consequences. When children are in school and they are sick and they have germs, they spread them to other people in the classroom.

[08:35:05]

They spread them at recess. They spread them on the bus. They take them home to their family.

And in cases of some of the illnesses that are vaccine preventable, like measles, children are sick two days before they even know they're sick. They are transmitting the virus.

And so, the personal choice here also impacts other children, children who are in every school can't get vaccines because they're fighting cancer and getting chemotherapy, because they have immune systems that don't allow them to get vaccines because they've had a heart or lung transplant, and they live and work in your communities.

Their individual freedom and choice to be safe is removed when you remove school vaccine requirements.

BOLDUAN: It does seem that the president is somewhat conflicted on this, just from public statements. He's given Robert Kennedy, Jr., the health and human services secretary, kind of full support to continue to just run, as he had said at one point, go wild on public health and pushing his vaccine skepticism, which is what this basically is somewhat rooted in, you could say, coming out of Florida, though they do just say personal choice.

But asked about rolling back vaccine mandates for school kids, I want to play what the president said just days ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You have some vaccines that are so amazing. The polio vaccine, I happen to think, is amazing. A lot of people think that COVID is amazing.

I think you have to be very careful when you say that some people don't have to be vaccinated. Look, you have vaccines that work. They just, pure and simple, work.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: What do you do with that? How much does just the simple confusion and mixed messaging coming from leaders hurt your efforts to protect children?

KRESSLY: Very much so.

The president was right. Vaccines are safe and effective and save lives.

And the other thing that your listeners should understand is that many of the illnesses and diseases in the school vaccine schedule, like measles, like polio, we have no treatment for. We cannot treat your child if they get sick. We can support their body, and some children will be able to fight it off and recover, and some children will have lasting impacts to their health, and some children will die.

We can't treat all -- we don't have medical treatments for many of those illnesses on the vaccine schedule. And so, the best way we keep every child safe in every community is have high vaccination rates so that we can -- we can have strong communities and children can go about their daily lives of living, playing, learning and growing.

BOLDUAN: And when it comes down to when there is confusion and it's turning into mass confusion over what is right and what is wrong, the only best place to look is to your child's pediatrician, is to a Dr. Susan Kressly.

Doctor, thank you very much for your time this morning. I really appreciate it.

John? BERMAN: This week, CNN shining a light on innovators finding creative ways to solve problems around the world. They are Champions for Change.

One California mother is pioneering the nation's first fully electric school bus district. CNN's Bill Weir has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For 100 years, the Wheels on the Bus have gone round and round, round and round, with very little improvement. Yellow diesel dinosaurs belching fumes all through the town and with no way to track America's most precious cargo.

RITU NARAYAN, FOUNDER & CEO, ZUM: Like you can track your pizza. You can track your packages, but you have no idea where your children are.

WEIR: My champion for change is a mom/engineer who set out to reinvent the school bus. It's a company called Zum.

When Ritu Narayan moved to Silicon Valley and started a family, she found the same child transport challenges her mother faced back in India.

NARAYAN: Nothing had changed. This problem is generational. It is very much societal. Why is the technology not applied and how I can revolutionize this whole thing?

WEIR: Even in the epicenter of door to door on time delivery. We didn't think in this way when it came to our kids.

NARAYAN: Yeah, it is a problem hidden in plain sight, like nobody realizes it's the largest mass transit system in the country, 27 million kids commute twice daily on this infrastructure.

WEIR: Hi, Mateo. I love your shirt. I love that dragon shirt. That's so cool.

And for special needs families like Mateo's, knowing exactly when a safe, quiet ride will arrive at both ends is an educational game changer.

[08:40:08]

LIZBETH ZAMORA, MATEO'S MOM: Sometimes they'll tell you like it's coming a little early or it's running late, but right now, it's still on schedule.

WEIR: That's so great, and our driver is Diana.

ZAMORA: Yes. So it gives you the driver's information.

Ready? Have a good day. Bye, Mateo.

WEIR: So he rode a diesel bus, right, his first year? ZAMORA: Right.

WEIR: What was that like for him? He has autism.

ZAMORA: Right. So, it was a little uncomfortable because he -- the noise. So, he was just sometimes, like, cover his ears, you know? It bothered him. Now, with these buses, like, you can barely hear him. So that's not an issue anymore.

WEIR: Oakland became Zum's first big customer, thanks to Kimberly Raney, who came from package delivery at FedEx.

KIMBERLY RANEY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF TRANSPORTATION, OAKLAND UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT: We gave them a little bit of a shot. We also tried them on our most difficult students to see really how well the app and the technology held up.

And it was great. Our parents loved it. We like to call it like Uber, Lyft meets FedEx type, Amazon meets Tesla, and we've merged them all together into almost the exact perfect operation.

NARAYAN: Normally, school buses stop for three minutes every stop. And the reason for that is they want to make sure the kid is there and nobody has missed each other. In our case, we are able to reduce that boarding time to eight seconds per stop.

WEIR: Wow. By trying to solve one problem, she ended up solving all kinds of other problems.

Since there is a national shortage of bus drivers, smarter routes make the most of everybody. And the extra juice saved gets used after school because these aren't just busses, they are giant portable batteries which get plugged into the grid after school and during summers.

NARAYAN: Seventy-four buses in Oakland are giving 2.1 gigawatt hours of energy, which is equivalent to powering 400 homes annually.

Zum is in 14 states, 4,000 schools across the country, and we are rapidly growing. So, our mission is to enable 10,000 buses in the next few years.

WEIR: School bus by day, power plant by night.

NARAYAN: That's right. That's right.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WEIR (on camera): It's one of those, why didn't we think of this earlier ideas, right?

BERMAN: It just makes so much sense all across the board.

WEIR: It really does, even especially in this era of rolling blackouts, sometimes, especially in California, wildfires, to have a portable battery, you can move to where the power source is needed. It's predictable. You know exactly when those batteries are going to be used in the mornings and afternoons. Sitting over summers. It's just a great idea.

BERMAN: Every little aspect of it, including the sounds for that -- that young boy with autism there who won't be hearing the roar of the diesel engine.

WEIR: Exactly. Yeah, and they start their days sort of chilled out, peaceful. The mom knows where they are. When they got off. Win, win, win, win.

BERMAN: Win, win. What a champion.

All right. Bill Weir, thank you very much for that.

"Champions for Change' airs this Saturday at 10:00 p.m. here on CNN.

Kate?

BOLDUAN: Still ahead for us, Russia could soon face new sanctions from the United States. But are there signs that President Trump is serious about it this time?

And it was a gripping tragedy and a wild story. Now, an Australian woman faces her sentence for killing three people using poisonous mushrooms.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:47:53]

BOLDUAN: Breaking at this hour, President Trump ramping up threats of immigration crackdowns, as well as crime enforcement in major cities across America -- Chicago, Boston -- and promises from the White House border czar that more cities are coming.

This morning, a new city the president is targeting, Baltimore.

And Baltimore's mayor, Brandon Scott, is vowing to fight back, saying the city does not need federal troops. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR BRANDON SCOTT (D), BALTIMORE: We don't need an occupation. We need a federal government that is working the right way to reduce gun violence. And that's the way that we've been doing it here in Baltimore.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: With me now is the mayor of another major American city, Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan -- Mike Duggan. He also is right now running for governor of Michigan, which we will get to.

It's great to see you. Thank you for being here.

MAYOR MIKE DUGGAN, DETROIT: Thanks for having me, Kate.

BOLDUAN: It has been -- we were saying it's been a moment since I've seen you in person, so I appreciate your time.

So, you have the mayor -- let's talk about what's going -- going on in Illinois and Chicago. The mayor of Chicago, the governor of Illinois, they're pushing back very hard against these enforcement efforts and the threats coming from President Trump that he is going to be moving in with federal law enforcement.

What would you do if he wanted to do the same in Detroit?

DUGGAN: Well, of course, neither the president or anybody from the administration has suggested that. When I got elected in 2013, we had 750 carjackings, the most in America.

BOLDUAN: Right.

DUGGAN: This year, we'll have fewer than 75. We've been down 90 percent.

Detroit's the city that other police departments are coming to, to see how we've gotten the violence down.

And this year, we've actually had a partnership with the Trump administration. The U.S. attorney that President Trump put in, Jerome Gorgon, has doubled the number of federal prosecutors prosecuting gun crimes. And we are going to have the fewest homicides this year since 1965.

I'm not sure what the reason is, but we have the kind of partnership with the Trump administration that Mayor Scott has been looking for in Baltimore. They're working with us prosecuting the gun violence, not trying to disrupt what we're doing.

BOLDUAN: It's actually really noteworthy, and something I was thinking about knowing that you were coming in is that -- I mean, the president has targeted Detroit before. I remember vividly when he was giving a speech during the campaign saying --

[08:50:01]

DUGGAN: Right, right.

BOLDUAN: -- if Kamala Harris wins, that every city in America is going to be just like Detroit, saying that in front of a bunch of people from Detroit.

But -- and according to FBI stats, Detroit is still -- while major progress has been made, Detroit is among the cities facing some of the highest crime rates still across the country, according to FBI stats. But again, Detroit has not been mentioned by Donald Trump once this round. Why do you think that is?

DUGGAN: So, you look at what happened in the four-day Labor Day weekend, where a lot of cities in this country, you reported -- BOLDUAN: Uh-huh.

DUGGAN: -- are huge numbers of shootings. One city, upwards of 50 shootings.

That four-day weekend, Detroit had eight.

We have changed the trajectory. I'm not telling you we've solved the problem --

BOLDUAN: Right.

DUGGAN: -- because I think eight is far too many. But we actually have a partnership with our local violence prevention folks, county sheriff. But we have the ATF, the DEA, and the Justice Department has been helping us shut these gangs down.

And I think the fact that what we're working together with the Trump administration bring the violence down, I would hope you start to see more cities move to that kind of partnership.

BOLDUAN: But candidly, there's a lot of politics at play here. Do you think that any of this, the fact that -- let's just say, Detroit and Michigan has not been targeted by Trump on this has anything to do with the fact that the outgoing governor, Gretchen Whitmer, is taking a decidedly different approach to President Trump than you've seen with the governor of Illinois or the governor of California? Gretchen Whitmer has just worked with the president --

DUGGAN: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: -- rather than taking an adversarial anti-Trump approach.

DUGGAN: Well, there's no question. Michigan is benefiting from the fact that Governor Whitmer went to D.C. I mean, she saved 5,000 jobs in an air force base in Macomb County because she went to see the president.

People remember the picture of her putting the folder over her face.

BOLDUAN: Yeah.

DUGGAN: She saved 5,000 jobs for Michigan. And I think she's taken exactly the right approach. Certainly, she's made it easy for us.

And I'm not the kind of politician that gets into fights with people. I didn't get into fights with the president his first term, and I'm not getting into fights with him now.

BOLDUAN: But when it comes to Detroit, though, specifically Detroit has ordinances that generally align with sanctuary city policies. I mean, are you telling local law enforcement if ICE -- if federal agents come in, do not cooperate with them on immigration operations?

DUGGAN: Detroit is not a sanctuary city. Now, the Detroit Police Department doesn't enforce federal law. BOLDUAN: Right.

DUGGAN: That's not our job.

But if we arrest somebody for breaking and entering, put their fingerprint in the system and ICE calls and says, "That's an undocumented immigrant we've been looking for," we honor that detainer agreement.

We did that under Obama. We did that under the first Trump administration. We did it under Biden. We're doing it today.

So, we're not a sanctuary city, and we're not drawing the kind of controversy other cities are.

BOLDUAN: You are running for governor. December of last year, you ditched the Democratic Party. You're a longtime Democrat. Now you're running as an independent for governor.

And since, you've been offering -- I'm going to describe it as a pretty scathing rebuke of the Democratic Party, I've now heard you more than once say that the Democratic Party cares about two things -- they hate Republicans, in general, and they hate Donald Trump, in particular. And they don't stand for anything else.

Why? I mean, coming from -- coming from now a former Democrat, why -- why are the Democrats so bad?

DUGGAN: Well, you go back to when I ran for mayor of Detroit in 2013, when the city was in bankruptcy, half the street lights were on. You called 911 and the ambulance didn't show up for an hour.

And as the city was declining, everything was us versus them, black versus white, city versus suburban politics. And I went to Detroit. We hadn't had a white candidate for mayor in 40 years.

BOLDUAN: Yeah.

DUGGAN: I said, our problem is the politics of division. We're not as far away from turning the city around as we look. And the people of the city embraced me and have elected me three times.

BOLDUAN: What -- are Republicans doing anything different?

DUGGAN: And so, I look at what's happening in the state right now. And in Michigan, we just had a report, more than 60 percent of third graders in Michigan don't read at grade level. And the Republicans and Democrats are fighting with each other and there's no budget.

The kids went back to school last week, and not one of the 4,000 schools has a budget, because the Republicans and Democrats are fighting with each other.

And I'm just trying to change politics.

BOLDUAN: Uh-huh. DUGGAN: I changed it in Detroit, and I think a positive way. And I think we need to change in the state of Michigan.

BOLDUAN: Mayor, do you really think that the Democratic Party stands for nothing?

DUGGAN: Again, if you were to watch your show for the last 24 hours, most of the conversation and Republicans is why they hate Democrats, and almost all the conversation the Democrats is why Republicans are bad and why Trump is bad.

When are we going to see somebody come out and say, "Here's my affordable housing policy"? That's what I'm doing. Here's my plan to educate third graders. That's what I'm doing in the state.

And I've got huge numbers of people in rural areas and cities coming in and saying, I'm not all one side or the other. I've been waiting for somebody to say, there's a place for those of us who are in the middle.

BOLDUAN: An independent bid, an independent run is -- always comes with a lot of risk. But you are bringing in a lot of fundraising so far from the numbers I've seen.

Mayor, thanks for your time. I appreciate it.

DUGGAN: Thanks for having me.

BOLDUAN: Thanks for coming in.

John?

BERMAN: All right. This morning, new video shows the moment a 23- year-old Ukrainian refugee was stabbed to death on a light rail train in Charlotte. The video shows Iryna Zarutska sitting down in front of the suspect.

[08:55:02]

Investigators say minutes later, he pulls out a knife and strikes her three times. According to an affidavit, the two had no interaction before the stabbing.

The suspect has been charged with first degree murder. In 2015, he was sentenced to six years in prison for robbery with a dangerous weapon. That's according to a CNN affiliate.

Happening now, South Korea's foreign minister is on his way to Washington after days of tension over an immigration raid on a factory in Georgia. The South Korean government says it will send a charter plane to bring back about 300 workers who were detained. The ICE raid, one of the largest in recent years, comes as South Korea has invested billions in U.S. manufacturing.

An Italian teenager and video gamer known as "God's Influencer" has become the Catholic Church's first millennial saint. Pope Leo canonized Carlo Acutis yesterday at the Vatican. Acutis was just 15 years old when he died in 2006 of leukemia. During his short life, he set up a website to document miracles and spread his faith, earning him the nickname "God's Influencer".

President Trump signaling he is ready to hit Russia with a new round of sanctions after his numerous deadlines for Russian leader Vladimir Putin to make a deal with Ukraine, have gone nowhere. The president says he will speak with Putin very soon, but no indication of exact timing on that.

Russia really not making any moves toward peace, launching its largest air assault on Ukraine since the war started using more than 800 drones, hitting a government building in Kyiv for the first time. The attack also struck homes. An infant is among the dead.

With us now is Kira Rudik, a member of the Ukrainian parliament.

Thank you so much for being with us.

First, I do know this was one of the worst strikes on Kyiv in a long time. Just checking in that you and yours are all okay this morning.

KIRA RUDIK, MEMBER OF UKRAINIAN PARLIAMENT: Hello, John, and thank you so much for having me.

Yes. This time, we were lucky. Unlike people who were killed at that drone attack. But the truth is that here on the ground in Ukraine, you can never be sure that you will survive until tomorrow. You can never be sure that when you go to bed in the evening, that you will wake up in the morning.

And this is why the war needs to end. This is why we are looking at the United States as our strongest ally, as the leader of the democratic world, that will help us to survive, that will help us to go back to the normality where you -- you can just simply know that you will live another day.

BERMAN: What do you think the president Trump is waiting for?

RUDIK: The truth is, we do not know. Maybe he is hoping that Putin will suddenly realize that he is a war criminal and decide to pull back. We know that that's not going to happen. Russia is actually preparing for another offensive, in the east of our country in autumn, and we know that they will going to go ahead with it. We know that Russia is ramping up their drone and missile production.

This is why the amount of drones that attacked Kyiv, two days ago was more than 800. Can you just imagine this amount and the amount of air defense systems that we are supposed to have to take down an attack like this?

So, no, Putin wouldn't stop, the threats wouldn't stop him. And the only thing that can stop him, and this is something that we have proven with our actions is the rule of force. And this is why the sanctions need to go ahead. The additional military support for Ukraine need to go ahead. Otherwise, Putin will -- will have the upper hand over the American president.

Is it something that anybody in the United States wants?

BERMAN: You say Putin will have the upper hand over the American president. What do you think is happening in terms of that relationship?

RUDIK: Well, you have seen that President Trump was giving Putin only the carrots, not the sticks, hoping that there's good approach. Will lean the dictator his way and that will allow him to be negotiated into stopping the war.

But if you look at the facts, there has not been any single fact of Putin wanting to end the war since the beginning of President Trump administration. So, after the call, the first call of American president to Russian dictator, there was the massive attack on Kyiv right away. There was attacks, demonstrative attacks right after the meeting in Alaska, and right now, after the meeting in China, where Putin was obviously telling his allies about the weakness of the West.

This is the public humiliation of American strengths, of American interests, of American power. And it just simply needs to end because it's not only Ukraine. The world is watching.

BERMAN: Kira Rudik, member of the Ukrainian parliament -- again Kyiv suffering one of the worst attacks it has since the war began, both on government buildings and civilian infrastructure and homes. Thank you so much for being with us. Please stay safe.

Brand new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

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