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U.S. Strikes Iran as War Widens to More Countries; Father Sentenced to Serve 15 Years for Son's School Shooting; Growing Number of Americans Turning to AI for Health Questions; 40 Million People Under Heat Alerts this Weekend; Dulles Renovation to Get Rid of Infamous People Movers Shuttles. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired July 30, 2026 - 15:30   ET

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

[15:30:00]

ADM. JAMES STAVRIDIS, CNN SENIOR MILITARY ANALYST: Bigger and bigger, and it's moving almost inexorably toward the West. Think of Western Front. We talked about that in World War II.

Here it is, the Red Sea, the Suez Canal, owned and operated by Egypt, strikes on Jordan. And the Iranians are also threatening NATO partners, saying, whatever you do, NATO partners, don't allow your bases to be used for strikes against us. So we're seeing a kind of inexorable movement to the West here, Brianna, and it's very worrisome.

Here's the play. The Iranians are pulling in as many of the Arab states as they can, hoping that they, the Arab states, will turn around, put pressure on the U.S. to pull out. I think it's going to backfire on them.

And I'll close with this. I am seeing pretty credible reporting that the Saudis are trying to put together a coalition of Arab states in order to push back on this Red Sea challenge they're facing. So I don't think this is going to work for Iran, but that's the game they're playing.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: And you also are looking at Iran reiterating the Strait of Hormuz is going to remain closed. You have 14 mostly regional countries backing that Maritime Defense Alliance that's supposed to protect the shipping routes, the global trade. What is the future of global shipping through all of these regional waterways look like in your view?

STAVRIDIS: You've put your finger on why all this matters beyond the pretty obvious day-to-day impact on the global economy of shutting down a major strait. Why it really matters is, broadly speaking, are we going to preserve freedom of the high seas? Are we going to preserve transit rights through straits around the world?

Are we going to protect our Suez Canal, Panama Canal, and other areas of the oceans that are so crucial to trade? So I think, again, you're going to see Iran's efforts here backfire. It'll lead to the coalition that you and I just talked about of Arab states. But what I'm hoping for, Brianna, is the Europeans who, after the United States and perhaps China had the third most powerful combination of warships, will the Europeans come into this alongside the U.S. to reopen the strait? I'm hoping that is what happens. And that would be, in that case, a real strategic mistake by the Iranians to broaden this conflict.

KEILAR: And speaking of Europe, Iran's foreign minister actually warned two European countries, Cyprus and Bulgaria, against allowing the U.S. military to use their bases. How much ability does Iran have to back up those kind of warnings?

STAVRIDIS: Limited, but not completely benign. Meaning, if you look at the ranges of their maximalist ballistic missiles, in theory, they could reach all the way to Eastern Europe, Bulgaria, or into the Eastern Mediterranean, where the nation of Cyprus, not a NATO member, by the way, but a European Union member sits. So again, Iran is pushing at the Arab world to the West.

Now we're seeing them push toward the European world even further. Ultimately, I think this will backfire on the mullahs in Tehran. I hope it does.

KEILAR: Today, China's foreign minister dismissed reports from Reuters that Beijing is sending three to 400 shoulder-fired air defense missile launchers to Iran. That's according to the country's state-run news agency. U.S. intel had indicated that China was preparing to deliver new air defense systems to Iran. So I think that there was this expectation of that. That's what CNN's reporting has been. What kind of concerns does this raise for you?

What does this look like?

STAVRIDIS: It's not just the package of potential shoulder-fired missiles, whether that's a good piece of intel or less assured. But what ought to worry all of us is if China is going to line up alongside Iran to the degree of providing military-grade hardware or even Byronic components that go into it, that's extremely worrisome because it gives Tehran a lifeline. It's the phone-a-friend concept.

They've already, Tehran, worked closely with Russia. If Beijing starts to step in alongside Russia supporting Tehran, we'll have a bigger problem that could, final thought, bleed over into the Pacific as well.

KEILAR: Admiral James Stavridis, thank you so much for being with us.

[15:35:00]

STAVRIDIS: You bet, Brianna.

KEILAR: Boris.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Turning back to our breaking news in Georgia, a judge has sentenced the father to 15 years in prison for the murders his son committed during a 2024 school shooting. The families of those killed are now reacting to the decision.

Let's go to CNN's Isabel Rosales outside the courtroom in Winder. Isabel, what do these families have to say?

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Boris, here in about 17 hours, students at Appalachee High School will hear the opening bell marking their first day back to school. It is the same bell that we could hear repeatedly ringing in the backdrop of Colt Gray's taped confession, admitting that he used a gun and killed two students and two teachers. Well, today we have a sentence, a sentence for his father, a sentence that's at the core of the anguish and grief in this community.

And not only that, but also a landmark case, because Colin Gray is the first parent in the United States to be convicted of murder for a school shooting carried out by their child. And what he was handed down was 15 years in prison. I could see Colin right in front of me, he was flushed, he was breathing rapidly.

We could hear and see family members in the rows behind us crying. They were clearly disappointed. And I caught up with a few of them outside of the courtroom who told me they wanted more than this, more than 15 years.

They thought that the state had proven a strong case and they vowed to follow him to any parole hearing in the future. Now, of course, the state presented this case that he was criminally negligent, not only by buying his son an AR-15 style rifle for Christmas, but also not securing it, not keeping it locked, even despite all the red flags and repeated warnings that he could be a danger. Listen to the family members, what they said in court.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TERRY MCELHANNON, GRANDFATHER OF SHOOTING SURVIVOR TAYLOR JONES: Why are we here today? It's because of him. His actions and his neglect are responsible for what happened here.

Though he did not shoot the gun, he bought the bullets.

SHAYNA ASPINWALL, WIDOW OF MURDER VICTIM RICHARD ASPINWALL: Colin could not take his son to therapy, therefore I have to take mine. Ricky got to see her on her first day of kindergarten, but not her last. I have had to learn how to navigate a life I never imagined living.

Every morning I wake up hoping, even for a split second, that this was all a nightmare. Then reality returns. The empty space beside me, the silence in our home, and the questions our daughters ask are constant reminders that our lives have been permanently changed.

The trauma the students and teachers faced by seeing my husband laid dead on the floor of the hallway because Colin could not be responsible gun owner.

(END VIDEO CLIP) ROSALES: And the father-in-law of one of the victims, Richard Aspinwall, the coach, one of the two teachers who died there, told me that the D.A., Brad Smith, told him that Colin Gray will be eligible for parole once he has served 60 percent of his 15-year sentence. That would mean in another seven years. Meanwhile, I spoke to Colin's defense attorney, one of them, this morning before court, and he told me, first on CNN, that they will appeal.

SANCHEZ: And what are you hearing about that potential appeal? What it might look like, Isabel?

ROSALES: Yes, we're keeping an eye on this. This would, if in fact it continues to move forward, would go to the appellate court that's based out of Atlanta. We're asking those questions and we'll keep you up to date.

SANCHEZ: Isabel Rosales, thank you so much for that reporting.

Coming up, more and more people are using AI chatbots for questions about their health. Is that really a reliable source? Can they be trusted with your data?

We're paging Dr. Sanjay Gupta when we come back.

[15:40:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SANCHEZ: Everybody wants to know more about their health and it seems like a lot of people are turning to artificial intelligence to get answers.

KEILAR: That's right. In fact, a poll by KFF found one in three Americans have consulted an AI chat bot with health related questions with some even going so far as to upload their medical records. CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta shows us the pros and possible cons of trusting AI with something so important.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: So ChatGPT is saying you can now upload your medical records, including things like Apple Health, if you were a tracker of some sort, things from MyChart, from Epic, hoping to create a sort of more personalized response to people when they ask health questions. Hundreds of millions of people around the world are doing this. One in three Americans, as you mentioned, are doing this. So they want to create a more personalized experience.

They hope certain things will sort of come out of it, being able to explain notes more clearly from a doctor's visit, understanding how your health picture may have changed over time. I mean, a lot of medical records are longer than Moby Dick. So being able to take that really quickly and consolidate it into a timeline, that can be really helpful. Considering options, if you're faced with some sort of medical

question, these are all areas where they think it can help. It'll be interesting to see what happens in the future, because doctors, I can tell you, are already using AI to help summarize patient records before they come in.

And now, in a sense, patients could be allowed to do the same thing if they upload their medical records. Now, a couple of concerns. One is the accuracy of the information coming from AI.

We know, everyone knows, that they can make errors. These platforms can make errors.

[15:45:00]

The way that I sort of looked at it is that it is often better than Dr. Google as a general starting point. It can be more personalized if you do upload your medical records. And you can get second opinions, which is sort of a strange thing to say, but if it's ChatGPT giving you one answer, you're not sure, you could try another AI platform to get sort of a second opinion. That's starting to happen.

How you prompt the AI platform is probably going to be the biggest issue of all. How you ask a question, how you sort of learn to ask those questions. And also, if you're mirroring, for example, a lot of anxiety to the platform, it may mirror that back to you.

So it may take you down a path of greater anxiety, depending on how you're asking the questions. So we'll have to see how that sort of plays out for people in the long run.

Privacy, another big concern. Now the platforms, like ChatGPT says, they're going to encrypt all this data. They're going to ask you how long you want to keep the data on their platform. You can remove the data at any given time.

But at the same time, they're not bound by federal law to sort of protect the data the way hospitals and clinics and doctors are. So that's something to keep in the back of the mind. They say that they will encrypt the data. You won't get targeted ads, for example.

But that's, again, remains to be seen. Keep in mind, there have been other companies that have been the subject of hacks, for example. Companies that subsequently lost the data in some way.

23andMe, that happened with them. And a lot of that really sensitive data got out into the public. So there's going to be these concerns about privacy.

There's going to be these concerns about accuracy. But at the same time, hundreds of millions of people using these platforms, and this may be a way to make the information they get more personalized for them.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KEILAR: Our thanks to Dr. Sanjay Gupta for that report.

And now to some of the other headlines that we're watching this hour. A Senate health committee voting to advance the nomination of President Trump's pick for CDC director, Dr. Erica Schwartz, after she faced scrutiny over her independence and autonomy to lead the agency. Schwartz's nomination now moves to the full Senate, where it's unlikely it will receive a full vote before the August recess.

Also, fears of inflation are driving mortgage rates up to their highest level in a year. The average rate is now 6.66 percent. It's not a great number, let's just be honest, for a 30-year fixed rate home loan. It's the highest since July of last year, according to Freddie Mac, and the biggest one-week jump in more than two months. Still, today's rate slightly lower than it was at this time last year.

SANCHEZ: And the K-pop supergroup BTS says they will not submit any music to be considered for a Grammy award at next year's ceremony. This just weeks after the academy announced a new category for Asian pop music. All seven members of the band posted, quote, I hope that music can be heard and loved for what it is, rather than being divided by region or language.

The CEO of the Grammys told CNN he's saddened by the group's choice, but quote, as a music creator, I understand and respect their decision. The new Asian pop music performance category will debut at the 2027 Grammy Awards.

So millions of Americans are going to be baking under the sun this week with a heat dome hitting the western U.S.

KEILAR: A dozen states could see record-breaking temperatures in the U.S. We have CNN's Derek Van Dam with the forecast.

DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yet another intense and expansive heat wave is building across the western U.S. Right now, we have over 35 million Americans that are under heat alert, stretching from Phoenix to Southern California. This includes Los Angeles. You might be tempted to head to the coastline but be aware there is a high riptide risk at the moment.

And that's all thanks to a departing hurricane. This is Hurricane Genevieve. You can see it in the bottom portion of the TV screen there.

That's kicking up the swell across the coastal areas of southern and central California. So just take care if you head to the beaches. It'll be cooler there, but of course, the waves will be extra large kicked up from that departing hurricane.

Meanwhile, the heat wave extends as far north as the border of the U.S. and Canada, Billings, Montana, Salt Lake City, Utah, into Phoenix, Arizona. We have the potential to break daily record highs with the peak of this heat wave right through the course of the weekend. Now, we often talk about Death Valley, right?

This is the area where the hottest temperature on the planet has been recorded. I don't think that we will break that, but certainly we could be rivaling these types of temperatures as we progress through the course of the weekend. In fact, in Phoenix here, we'll see the mercury in the thermometer climb above 115 degrees for multiple days.

This has only happened 10 times since records began over 130 years ago. So we've got 12 U.S. states over the western parts of the country that will likely set daily record high temperatures through the peak of this heat wave. And the overnight lows, they're not going to provide a lot of relief, unfortunately.

[15:50:00]

We'll drop into the lower 90s for Phoenix. It's a dry air, so some locations will cool off considerably more than that, but this is not going to allow our body to cool off the way that it would expect to at nighttime.

We've got extreme heat risks across much of the desert southwest, and even into some of those larger population densities in and around Los Angeles. You want to take care as you head outdoors, avoid sunshine, and of course, stay hydrated. Back to you.

KEILAR: 116, that's crazy.

SANCHEZ: Hot.

KEILAR: That's rough. That's rough.

All right, coming up, getting to your plane at Washington Dulles Airport may get a lot easier in the coming years, but you're going to miss out on some fun. That's what we're, you know what we're talking about, people.

We'll have that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:55:00]

KEILAR: The all-new CNN original series, "DECADES IN SPORTS," takes a look at the cultural and political milestones that have shaped the world of sports in America.

SANCHEZ: Leading up to the series premiere, CNN's Omar Jimenez dives into a new chapter of sports history, an especially dark one for me personally, the summer of 2026 in New York City.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: In New York City, the summer started with history. The New York Knicks bringing home an NBA championship for the first time in 53 years.

SPIKE LEE, FILMMAKER: It's a love fest here. Everybody's wearing a Knicks t-shirt, a hat. The word is connection.

And it's a beautiful thing. And I know people who don't live here think that's some BS, but this is straight up.

JIMENEZ (voice-over): You can even feel it on the New York City subway. It's one of actor and superfan John Turturro's favorite places to be after a Knicks win.

JOHN TURTURRO, ACTOR: It's like a small town. All of a sudden, you're like, I'm in this city that no one ever looks at each other and everyone's talking to each other. And that's the power of the beauty of sports.

It's egalitarian, you know, and everybody can share that.

JIMENEZ: And this was just how the summer started. Enter the World Cup, lighting up stadiums across the country and living rooms, offices during work hours and sports bars across the city. There are more than a hundred free watch parties in every one of the five boroughs put on by the city.

But of course, there can only be one winner. With Spanish fans storming the streets in victory, it caps off one of the most beautiful eras in New York sports history. But it represents a feeling that transcends anything that could happen on a court or on the pitch.

Turturro puts it like this.

TURTURRO: It's like when the Yankees were in the World Series in 2001, even though they lost, they brought, you know, after 9-11, they brought the city back to life. Because you could focus on something for a couple hours. And that's irreplaceable.

It's one of the joys of being alive.

JIMENEZ: A joy captured in a matter of weeks in New York City but remembered by those who experienced it for a lifetime. Myself among them.

Omar Jimenez, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SANCHEZ: Be sure to tune in the all new CNN original series, "DECADES IN SPORTS", back to back episodes premiere Sunday at 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific time.

And we end today on a delicate topic that can provoke anger and anxiety in Washington. The infamous Dulles Airport people movers.

KEILAR: That was such a hard story for you to cover. You just had to move on.

SANCHEZ: Yes, pivot.

KEILAR: Yes, a quick pivot.

All right, so President Trump says he plans to do away with those shuttles that take travelers from the terminal to the gates and back again in just a big renovation. These have long been unpopular with many travelers. But one person is a big fan.

CNN's Pete Muntean, who likes to make new friends where you jostle about in the people. Listen, sometimes even a stranger can fall over and sit on your lap.

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Where is everyone's sense of whimsy and wonder? These are from a bygone era where you were going to get on the people mover, have a martini right away, go straight to your plane. And it's 7:07, light up a cigarette and go to Heathrow.

KEILAR: It's someone's butt in your face. Let's just be honest. Right there. Right there.

MUNTEAN: This is one of those projects that President Trump really likes to own. And in announcing this yesterday, he really framed himself as a builder. And Trump personally said that he personally helped choose from about 30 architectural proposals before announcing this huge and sweeping plan to remake Dulles International Airport to what he says will come one of the world's best airports.

Big changes, changing C&D concourses, expanding the subway, adding new customers facilities, creating 5 million new square feet, 20 billion dollars project, keeps the Eero Saarinen frontage main terminal. That's the iconic part of Dulles, but of course, gets rid of the people movers. They are known officially as mobile lounges.

Get it right, folks on social media.

SANCHEZ: Is that even a lounge? It's also like a glorified bus.

MUNTEAN: Also called a moon buggy. These were designed by Chrysler and built by the Bud Corporation of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I personally love the people mover because where else are you going to get such an unobstructed view of a little, rich, scary town?

KEILAR: You love the countdown. You're like, oh, it's counting down. Are the clocks counting down? Ten seconds.

MUNTEAN: It's obnoxious. What is going to happen with the people movers if they get rid of them?

The whole idea here was to keep people movers for another 15 or 20 years. That was the update from the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority as of just last year.

[16:00:00]

Now this gets rid of the people movers by 2034. This replaces the C&D concourse and rebuilds, essentially builds out the AeroTrain. That's the subway underground the airport to replace the people movers officially. I hope the plan is to put these on govdeals.com so I can buy one and turn it into a bar.

KEILAR: That's what I was going to say. All right. Woo!

SANCHEZ: You're going to see a lot of people movers somewhere in D.C. KEILAR: Let's go to "THE ARENA" with Kasie Hunt. Starts right now.

END