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Axios Reporting Top Aides Shielded President Biden; Democrats Continue Support President Biden; Far-Right Party In France Leads First Round Of Elections; U.S. Military Bases In Europe On Heightened Alert; Hurricane Beryl Intensifies Into Category 4; Supreme Court To Rule On Trump's Claim Of Immunity; CNN Original Series Presents "Violent Earth With Liev Schreiber"; CNN Presents "Start Small, Think Big." Aired 5-6p ET

Aired June 30, 2024 - 17:00   ET

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

[17:00:00]

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN HOST: Fort Lauderdale was ready for hundreds of thousands of fans to celebrate with the team as the Stanley Cup made its way down the route. Attendees were encouraged to stay cool in their Panther pride with officials warning that jerseys might be too thick for Florida's humidity.

And the Panthers beat the Edmonton Oilers in Game 7 Monday to capture the first NHL championship in franchise history. Congrats to them. And thank you so much for joining me today. I'm Frederica Whitfield. The "CNN Newsroom" continues with Alisyn Camerota right now.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: Hello everyone. You're in the "CNN Newsroom." I'm Alisyn Camerota in New York. Tonight, President Biden is meeting with his family at Camp David. Multiple sources tell CNN the meeting was planned a long time ago for a photo shoot and it is not some kind of emergency gathering to discuss the future of his campaign.

But it has new significance in light of growing calls for the president to exit the race after Thursday's alarming debate performance. And now there's new polling that suggests voters' concerns are growing about the president's fitness for office. One of the burning questions since the debate is how much did President Biden's inner circle know about his apparent frailty before Thursday night.

"Axios" has new reporting that President Biden's closest aides have shielded him for years from the wider staff. Alex Thompson is the national political correspondent with "Axios" with this new reporting and he joins us now. Alex thanks so much for making time. Can you explain how these aides have been shielding or protecting the president?

ALEX THOMPSON, NATIONAL POLITICS CORRESPONDENT, AXIOS: Yeah absolutely. Some of it is just making sure that you know when they meet with people, when Biden meets with people that it's every once in a while, you know there's not really regular meetings with not even just mid-level staff but even that up that tier one above and one above that. You know, his core team is really not bigger than about 12 people. And you know this was really the instinct of two of his top aides.

They're sort of you know very nondescriptive names Anthony Bernal and Annie Tomasini. And their task was really made easier at the very beginning because of COVID. And so keeping a really tight circle around the president was just sort of built in as a practice but then over time those habits continued.

CAMEROTA: So in other words they started during COVID is that -- do I have that right and now they've continued to shield him from the wider staff.

THOMPSON: Yeah, absolutely. And that's part of the reason -- the reason why this has been such a shock to the system inside the White House is because the Joe Biden that they saw on Thursday night was unrecognizable to them. But as many of them have said to me, this could not have been the first time that he had acted that way. There is no way -- in the minds of a lot of people in the White House they are both sad because how this could affect the election. They're sad for him because it's great affection for him.

But they're also angry because they feel that this side of Joe Biden must have been known to at least some of his close aides and they hid that part of it not just from them but you know from potentially from voters and from Democrats and from donors.

CAMEROTA: Can you give us an example of how they keep the rest of the staff at bay?

THOMPSON: Yeah, absolutely. So, one just -- it's a little example but the resident staff of the White House, you know, who should be the staff that probably get the most actually just normal apolitical face time with the president. Now I talked to a few residents, staff officials including one that gave me a quote that basically said from day one, the very closest aides the president kept them at bay, kept them away from parts the residents would sometimes shut the door and rooms where they usually would be allowed.

Basically there was a huge division between the resident staff of the White House and the Biden family. They kept them very much at bay which struck many of them as unusual, including they said, it was even unusual compared to the Trump White House.

CAMEROTA: And I mean I know that I've read your article and I know that the White House and President Biden's pushback is that he's not comfortable with butlers and servants around him that that's just not his styl. He doesn't need that much help. And so, but the people that you're talking about, the closest aides, the Anthony Bernal and the Annie Tomasini, if all of this is true and they've been protecting him why didn't they protect him from Thursday night?

CAMEROTA: That is the million-dollar question. We just don't know and you know I think a lot of the aides, you know, expected that Joe Biden, you know, after doing a week of debate prep, everyone I've talked to said that he seemed good, he seemed fine. [17:04:59]

You know it wasn't like he was lighting the world on fire with his answers but he was doing well and they were sort of sort of surprised. And I think you know the fact that they've let him debate is, you know, sort of what's also driving this anger. If they even knew that this sort of Joe Biden was gonna show up, even if it was a possibility, you know, I think there's a lot of anger within Biden world that any of the close aides let him go on stage just because of the election, because of how this could affect his legacy.

And you know I would also say part of the reason that Joe Biden debated is because Joe Biden wanted to debate. I can tell you behind closed doors Joe Biden has always often says I feel so much younger than my age. Joe Biden has a little bit of, you know, what I've report on his denialism about how old he is and how old he can come across. So, I think it was probably a combination of the fact that Joe Biden really wanted to debate and then the people around him were like, well he's fine. But the actual mechanics of it we still don't know, we're still reporting it out.

CAMEROTA: You also have reporting this weekend if there's a specific window of time during the day when President Biden is fully engaged and not as engaged outside of that window so what is that?

THOMPSON: Absolutely. So, you know, you'll notice that the president usually if he has a public event on camera, it's usually between the hours of 10:00 and 4:00, and that's not an accident. It's usually those times when he has less gaffes, when he's less prone to misspeaking, when he doesn't stutter as much.

You'll notice that whenever he's traveling abroad or whenever he's having, you know, a really late rally or even a really late fundraiser, you know, just even going through the White House transcripts you can see that they have to correct his words a lot and he can meander, you know. I think of, you know, one particular fundraiser just last September in New York when Joe Biden repeated the Charlottesville story that he's often told about deciding to run.

He basically told the same story word-for-word just a few minutes apart. And then just at a recent rally in Detroit it was a late Sunday night, the White House transcription office had to correct the president's own words nine times. And so basically, what aides have told me is that he is just like he's solid between the hours of 10:00 to 4:00 but he often makes more mistakes he can ramble beyond those hours.

And there's a reason why he doesn't have many public events before 10:00. There is a reason he doesn't have many public events on camera after 4:00. And it's for that reason the limitations of his age and how the White House is adapted around them.

CAMEROTA: All the more curious why he agreed to a 9:00 p.m. debate of one of the rules. But Alex, thank you very much. We really appreciate you sharing all of your reporting with us. Thanks.

THOMPSON: Thanks so much.

CAMEROTA: Let's bring in our panel. We have CNN senior political commentator and former special assistant to President George W. Bush, Scott Jennings, and CNN political commentator and Democratic strategist Maria Cardona. Great to see both of you. Maria, what do you think of this new reporting from Alex Thompson that Biden's closest aides, but in particular, the Anthony Bernal who is, you know, a special assistant, I think to Jill Biden, the First Lady And then another top aide, Annie Tomasini, that they've been shielding him and protecting him even from people within the White House?

MARIA CARDONA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think that after Thursday night's debate, reporters are looking for any kind of breathless reporting about what happens behind the scenes so I don't really think much of it. Different presidents have different ways of interacting with their staff. Senior staff will always err on the side of protecting their principal.

I think what is really important here, Alisyn, is what is the Biden campaign and the Biden family going to do now. And what we have seen and this I think is relevant reporting is that the Biden campaign and President Biden himself is calling allies, calling supporters, calling donors, he did the rally on Friday which, you know, he was -- it was a night and day difference between the guy who showed up on Thursday and what he did on Friday.

He's reassuring people that he is committed to staying in. He is committed to winning. They understand that there is a lot of damage control that needs to be done and they are committed to doing it. And the other important thing here is, Alisyn, in terms of the recent numbers that come out right after the debate, the race substantially has not really shifted and the focus on Joe Biden has left no focus for what needs to be a focus on Donald Trump and what he said during the debate.

CAMEROTA: Absolutely. It has eclipsed most of the lies that President Trump told him. We can get into that, but I just want to challenge your numbers, Maria, because we do have new polls that are just out. Maybe we can pull them up in our control room.

[17:09:57]

But in terms of what voters think, voters did -- do feel more so today than they did even just, you know, a month ago whether he should run, whether, you know, if he's sort of been too compromised, whether he should run.

Seventy-two percent, this is the new CBS poll, say he should not be running for president. So, and that again is contrasted with February.

CARDONA: Sure.

CAMEROTA: So, you know, it's not just the pundits.

CARDONA: So, right.

CAMEROTA: It's not just the editorial boards.

CARDONA: Understood, but again, Alisyn, these kinds of polls the way that that question is asked it doesn't ask about the contrast. It doesn't ask about the choice, right? That is what is before us in November. That is what the $33 million dollars that President Biden was able to raise three times more than what the Trump campaign raise, that is where that matters because voters saw what happened Thursday night

CAMEROTA: Yeah.

CARDONA: They also heard what came out of Donald Trump's mouth. And what's interesting Alisyn, I need to tell this anecdote really quickly. I was doing analysis on CNN Espanol where the audience heard the debate through translators. The dials that were done for Spanish- language voters where they only heard it through translators, the independents, moved toward President Biden because of the craziness that they heard out of Donald Trump's mouth.

CAMEROTA: That is interesting. I mean, it's very interesting, Scott, actually when you contrast style versus substance there's a different answer. I find that interesting, but Scott your thoughts on all of this.

SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: First of all, everybody needs to be thanking Alex Thompson for what he's doing. I think he is covering and uncovering one of the biggest scandals in modern presidential history. The president of the United States for the last three and a half years apparently cannot be seen by more than 12 people.

However, we have seen a number of White House staffers and other Democrats, members of Congress, people in the party or whatever, claim repeatedly on our air and everywhere else, that they are routinely behind closed doors with him and that he is so lucid and then he's doing handstands and he's running around the room and riding unicycles and juggling knives.

It's obviously a complete and total fabrication. It's a farce. It's a lie. The president is compromised. Alex is -- if this were any other president and if it were Trump or any other Republican, we would be on the air right now talking about the 25th Amendment. It is a scandal what we've been told and what we're now hearing and what we all saw with our own eyes on Thursday night.

CAMEROTA: But Scott what about what Maria is saying, that all presidents have a, you know, inner circle that protects them and that, you know, not everybody can have access to the president. Isn't that -- would that have been the case --

JENNINGS: He said 12 people -- he said 12 people is about all he can see and he also said more importantly that between the hours of 4:00 p.m. and 10:00 a.m. the next day, he's not really up to the job.

CAMEROTA: Well --

JENNINGS: Now, I hate to say it. I hate to say it --

CAMEROTA: -- yes, I mean, I hear what you're saying.

JENNINGS: -- but stuff happens.

CARDONA: Come on, Scott. Come on, Scott.

CAMEROTA: I mean, Scott, I hear what you're saying, but you know, Donald Trump was off the clock a lot of the time. We have heard about how he was watching television.

CARDONA: Yeah.

CAMEROTA: I mean we heard a lot of that reporting when he was president so, it's hard to say -- I hear what you're saying Scott. Maria, Congressman Jamie Raskin told MSNBC this morning that there are, quote, "very honest and serious conversations" happening within the Democratic Party right now about what the next steps really should be. Wat are you hearing? Are you hearing those kinds of conversations?

CARDONA: Look, of course, and let's be real. There is concern among the Democratic Party after Thursday night, but the fact of the matter is that there has been no Democratic elected official, no DNC member and I was on a DNC call with Chairman Jamie Harrison. No one right now is calling for President Biden to step aside. Everyone understands that the president, what he has said thus far and what seems to be the case, he is going to stay in.

And so here is what happens Alisyn. Once that has been settled and right now that is settled, the president is our nominee he got the vast majority of all of the votes and has the majority of the delegates, all the delegates going into the convention, we need to understand the choice before us because you have a good man who had a bad night and the contrast is with a bad man who wants to destroy our Constitution, destroy our democracy, destroy our rights and freedoms and that's what Democrats understand.

CAMEROTA: I think that the question is if there's going to be a third way and so Scott, I mean, as you know he's meeting with his family that was always planned, but you've been at some of those behind-the- scenes meetings, not obviously with the Bidens, but what do you think is going to happen this weekend while this is --

JENNINGS: Well, there's reporting -- I mean there's reporting tonight from the "New York Times" that the Biden family strongly wants Joe Biden to stay in and the "Time" says that the strongest voice in the room is convicted felon, notorious influence peddler, and crack addict Hunter Biden.

[17:15:02]

Now, listen gravy trains with biscuit wheels have a lot of momentum and I understand why they want him to stay in the race. This is crazy. The issue is not the campaign. Joe Biden is not just a political property. He's the current president of the United States, stuff's happening every day. He's got two jobs, run for office and conduct the office while he's in it. Maria said nobody wants the president to step aside, nobody except for 72 percent of the American people in the poll you just put up, thinks he should step aside.

I mean, people are freaking out right now because of what they saw. You cannot unsee what we saw and you can also not unlearn what we have learned, which is that we've been lied to for three and a half years about this man's condition.

I have no doubt they're gonna stick with him, they're gonna leave him in there, and that's probably, you know, fine so we can go ahead and have this election and Donald Trump's gonna roll to victory. And when he does, Democrats will have no one to blame but themselves for going down this charade for so long.

CAMEROTA: So Scott --

CARDONS: But see --

CAMEROTA: Hold on -- hold on, Maria. A couple of things. Because of Biden's performance it has eclipsed much of what Donald Trump said so are Republicans comfortable with his answers at the debate? I mean here's what he said about the violence for instance on January 6. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: My question was what do you say to those voters who believe that you violated your constitutional oath through your actions and action on January 6, 2021 and worry that you'll do it again.

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Well, I didn't say that to anybody. I said peacefully and patriotically.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Well, he went on to say that, I mean, he went out to brag about what a great -- the January 6 was a high point basically of his tenure. I mean, he talked about, you know, the border. He sorts of pivoted away to all the things that were going well on January 6. Are Republicans comfortable with him not taking any responsibility for what happened on January 6 and calling it, you know, sort of a feather in his cap for that day?

JENNINGS: To the specific question are Republicans comfortable? Of course they are because what he did at the debate is what he did during the primary is what he did for the last two years and they renominated him and it wasn't really all that close. And I keep hearing people you know going off on Trump for not doing very well or whatever. I looked at the polls this morning, the CBS-YouGov poll, I mean people thought he won the debate 56 to 16, which was even a wider margin than the snap poll that CNN conducted on Thursday night.

The truth is Donald Trump just needed to deliver a simple message on inflation, immigration and Afghanistan and he did that. And by the way, one of the most and only one of the only coherent statements that Joe Biden delivered during the debate was when he claimed that not a single U.S. soldier had died while he's been commander-in-chief.

The most egregious lie told at that debate was that one because it dishonored the memory of the soldiers who died in Afghanistan and it was terrible and I can't believe there's not more outrage about that. There certainly is in the Republican Party.

CAMEROTA: Yeah.

JENNINGS: So, all in, I think Trump did fine.

CAMEROTA: Guys, we have to go, but I mean, I'll just say, Scott, I was talking about the substance not just the style of how he delivered it, but 54 percent of Americans also don't think that Donald Trump should run, but I was talking about how, you know, here is -- should Trump be running for president, 54 percent say no, 46 percent say yes but the point is, is that how he dealt with what actually happened on January 6. But either way, I take both -- I've got to go Maria. Five seconds go ahead --

CARDONA: There were also several things that President Biden said that were true. Donald Trump is a convicted felon.

CAMEROTA: Yeah.

CARDONA: He's a loser and a sucker and he's an existential threat to our democracy.

JENNINGS: Good try.

CAMEROTA: Okay.

CARDONA: All of that --

CAMEROTA: Well, Scott Maria thank you both very much.

CARDONA: Thanks, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Okay. Meanwhile, several U.S. military bases in Europe on heightened alert tonight because of a possible terror threat. We're gonna go live to the Pentagon to get some answers.

Plus, France's far-right party celebrating what could be a dramatic win over President Emmanuel Macron. What it means for the U.S.

And breaking news, we're tracking a Category 4 hurricane in the Caribbean tonight. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:20:00]

CAMEROTA: Breaking news out of France, the country's far-right party appears to have won the first round of France's parliamentary elections according to projections. In a stunning defeat, President Emmanuel Macron's centrist party came in third place. Voting turnout was at 67 percent, that's the highest in a first round in nearly 30 years. This is according to French officials. CNN's Jim Bittermann is following all of this for us live from Paris. So, Jim, how's the country reacting?

JIM BITTERMANN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well I think Alisyn in varied ways because I mean there's a lot of politicization in this country along the three kinds of leading political forces, one being on the left, the one being the extreme right and the centrist which Macron kind of represents, but the centrists are really took it on the chin during this election.

What we've seen since the election results have come in is that basically the extreme right got almost doubled or tripled rather, tripled the number of seats that they have in the National Parliament. They did not get enough apparently according to projections; they did not get enough to actually form a majority and therefore demand that their guy become the Prime Minister.

[17:24:51]

However, they did get enough to be a major force in the country and now what's happened is the other two political groupings, major political groupings, the Macron centrist and the people on the left are saying that they're going to form a kind of a blockade to stop the far-right extremists from coming to complete power.

Whether or not they can do this between now and the next round in the races across the country. There is something like half of the seats are what they call triangulares, which mean there are three candidates who have gone past the bar, tonight's bar of 12.5 percent of the vote, and as a consequence they will be presented in the second round unless somebody bows out.

And what they're basically saying is that people will bow out in order to stop the extreme rightists from coming to power. That may not work but that's what's going to happen between now and next Sunday when the second round takes place. Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: Man, just when we think U.S. elections are complicated. Jim, thank you for explaining all of that. Those many tears to us. I really appreciate it thank you.

BITTERMANN: Yeah, yeah.

CAMEROTA: All right, several American military bases in Europe are on high alert tonight over concerns of a terror threat. A U.S. official tell CNN they have not seen this level of threat in at least 10 years and they're urging service members to be vigilant. The threat includes the headquarters of U.S. European command in Germany. CNN's Oren Liebermann joins us now from the Pentagon with the latest. What are you hearing there Oren?

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Alisyn, according to two U.S. officials, U.S. military bases in Europe, several of them at least including Stuttgart, which you saw there, the headquarters of not only U.S. European command but also U.S. Africa command have gone to what's known as force protection condition Charlie. That is the second highest level of alert for threat level that the U.S. military has.

Here is how the US Army defines force protection condition Charlie. The Army says it applies when an incident occurs or intelligence is received indicating some form of terrorist action or targeting against personnel or facilities is likely. Now, it's not just these two U.S. officials saying this. The Army garrison in Bavaria which encompasses several locations has on its website that it's gone to force protection condition Charlie and then a number of military facilities throughout Europe have pointed out that there is an elevated level of risk and elevated threat level and to remain vigilant.

Now, it's unclear if this is a specific threat against one or a number of facilities or if it's more of a general threat at this point. It is worth pointing out that in Germany, they're currently hosting the European football championships, in Paris they're getting ready both for the Olympics and the Tour de France. So these are large gatherings that can frankly make attractive targets.

We have seen both German and French officials warn of the elevated threat levels around this in fact since March, according to the U.S. Embassy in Paris. France has been at its highest alert level and the embassy there warns of going towards large gatherings of people, which is of course exactly what the Olympics is. So we'll keep an eye on this Alisyn and see which way this goes and what more we can learn about the threat itself.

CAMEROTA: Okay, thank you very much for updating us, Oren Liebermann. All right, we're tracking Hurricane Beryl. The warm waters of the Caribbean helping to strengthen it into a monster storm. This is the earliest Category 4 hurricane we've ever seen. We'll speak to the director of NOAA's Hurricane Center, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:29:59]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: Hurricane Beryl now intensifying into a Category 4 hurricane with sustained winds of 130 miles per hour. This makes it the earliest Category 4 hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic. Hurricane warnings are in effect for several eastern Caribbean islands.

Joining us now is Michael Brennan, director of NOAA's National Hurricane Center. So, Michael, where is the storm headed right now?

MICHAEL BRENNAN, DIRECTOR, NOAA's NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER: Well, right now, it's moving very quickly to the west-northwest towards the Windward islands. We're very concerned about this area here between St. Vincent and the Grenadines down to Grenada.

That's the area that's most likely to experience that, you know, eyewall of Beryl, that we can see the very well-defined eye and satellite imagery. That's where we have those, you know, very strong 130 mile per hour winds. That's where we're going to see that very catastrophic storm surge moving through portions of the Windward islands over -- starting overnight tonight and through Monday morning. CAMEROTA: So, Michael, when you were on yesterday and we were talking the projections, were then that it could strengthen into a Cat 3. Are you surprised by how quickly it has intensified?

BRENNAN: Well, it certainly has intensified very quickly. You go back two days, it has gone up a hundred miles per hour in 48 hours, from a tropical depression to a Category 4 hurricane. You're forecasting rapid intensity change is really hard.

We were able to anticipate some degree of rapid strengthening but as it oftentimes happens, the storms tend to strengthen a little faster than we think and where it's difficult to determine where they're going to level off an intensity. It seems like it's sort of leveled off here at about 130 miles per hour for now.

CAMEROTA: So, again, which islands are going to be hit the hardest, do you think?

BRENNAN: Yeah, we're most concerned about this area here from St. Vincent down to Grenada and the Grenadines, which are small islands to the south of St. Vincent. Those are the areas that are most likely to experience the core of Beryl's eyewall, moving across them as we go through the morning hours on Monday. That's where our biggest concern is.

So, folks in those islands need to have their preparations done very soon by nightfall and find a safe place to ride out the storm through the night and into tomorrow.

CAMEROTA: Hmm. As we've been reporting, this is the first or the earliest Category 4 we've ever recorded in the Atlantic. So, is this climate change? Is that why -- is that why this is happening?

BRENNAN: Well, we knew we were going to have very warm ocean temperatures. Those have been around in the Atlantic going all the way back to last year into this year.

[17:34:58]

But that's no guarantee just because we have warm ocean waters that we're going to get powerful hurricanes. We have to have favorable conditions in the atmosphere and the storm has to be able to take advantage of those conditions.

With those warm waters with La Nina developing this year, we're expecting a very busy hurricane season, and that's what we're starting to see unfold. This is potentially a sign of more activity to come as we go through the rest of the season. We're not even close to the peak yet, which is when we tend to expect a storm like this to form August or September, not in late June or early July.

CAMEROTA: Do any models show it going north to mainland U.S.?

BRENNAN: At this point, our five-day track carries it west north westward across the Caribbean Sea and has it passing near Jamaica on Wednesday, and then in the vicinity of the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico, southern Gulf of Mexico, as a time we get to Friday. Beyond that time, we'll have to see if it continues to move more westward towards Mexico, maybe makes a bit of a northward turn toward Texas. That's really far out in time. We've got a lot of time to watch this play out for the mainland U.S.

CAMEROTA: Okay. Michael Brennan, thank you very much for the warnings here and for tracking the storm for us.

All right, so tomorrow morning, a highly consequential decision in American history on presidential immunity is expected from the Supreme Court. What this means for former President Trump, what it means for all future presidents.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:40:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: Tomorrow, we expect to finally hear the Supreme Court's critical ruling on Donald Trump's claim of immunity from criminal charges for his attempts to overturn Joe Biden's victory in 2020. This will have far-reaching implications.

Joining me now is CNN political analyst Julian Zelizer. he's a historian and professor at Princeton University, and the editor of the upcoming book, "Our Nation at Risk: Election Integrity as a National Security Issue." Julian, thank you very much for being here. What do you expect to happen tomorrow?

JULIAN ZELIZER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST, AUTHOR: Well, what we're hearing from legal experts is most likely are not the extremes, meaning granting total immunity or on the other hand saying there's no immunity but some middle way. So, some effort to carve out particular kinds of immunity that the president has, which will complicate and delay the case again, which would benefit President Trump politically and also set an important precedent on this issue.

CAMEROTA: So, from a historian's perspective, how important is tomorrow's ruling in our history?

ZELIZER: Very important. I mean, it will have immediate consequences, obviously, on this election, which I agree with most is historic in terms of potentially either protecting or putting the former president in some more legal jeopardy.

But in terms of the long term, we've had a gradual increase of presidential power throughout the 20th and 21st century, and providing more immunity to the person holding office will enhance the office whoever holds it in years to come.

CAMEROTA: Okay. So, let's turn to what's going on with President Biden this weekend. Give us some context historically to understand this moment, these two unpopular candidates running for president, but the incumbent facing calls to rethink his run at this late date. ZELIZER: Yeah. I can't give an exact comparison. We don't have anything like that. But in 1968, President Lyndon Johnson did decide that he would not run for re-election after a poor performance in a primary, and his vice president, Hubert Humphrey, runs instead.

And maybe this is a bit of a warning for Democrats but replacing the ticket, meaning making Humphrey the candidate instead of Lyndon Johnson, didn't solve the problem, and in the end, the victor in 1968 was Richard Nixon, the Republican running.

The divisions within the party, the concern over Vietnam, the unpopularity of the administration all bogged Hubert Humphrey down as much as it had harmed Lyndon Johnson.

So, I think that's a moment we can look at to gain some sense of the risks that this might entail.

CAMEROTA: But we don't know if Johnson would have won. I mean, unknowable.

ZELIZER: Correct, and this is a different situation. The anger with Johnson was over his public policies. Now, it's different and some of the concerns for Democrats is not Biden's policy, but can he campaign effectively in the next few months, can he defeat the Republican opponent. So, there are very important differences but it is just a reminder that it is not inevitable that the replacement leads to party success.

CAMEROTA: And so, President Biden, we know, and his family are at Camp David right now. This, we're told, was a long-planned trip to Camp David. But just tell us the significance of that location for monumental decisions.

ZELIZER: We've had everything there from peace accords worked out as President Jimmy Carter did when he worked on a Middle East agreement between the Egyptians and the Israelis. It was also famously where President Carter hold up -- hold himself up in 1979 before making a big address to the nation, which is remembered as the Malay speech, about what was wrong -- wrong with the country.

[17:44:55]

So, this is a place the presidents go to have time to really think through big decisions and to be insulated from the press and the public before they kind of go into turning points and -- and they emerge often in ways that change the course of the nation.

CAMEROTA: Professor Julian Zelizer, thank you very much.

ZELIZER: Thanks for having me.

CAMEROTA: Top Democrats reportedly looking at Biden replacement scenarios. We have new CNN reporting on how top party leaders are dealing with the aftermath of the president's poor debate performance.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [17:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: This week's episode of the CNN Original Series' "Violent Earth" takes a closer look at hurricanes. In the field of meteorology, there is no time more anticipated and feared than hurricane season, especially for that rare breed of adventure seeker, the storm chaser.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNKNOWN (voice-over): Oh, my God!

MAX OLSON, STORM CHASER: Harvey was insane. The winds start really picking up. We get our first hundred mile per hour gusts and things start just whipping down the road. There's sheet metal flying down the road, there are branches falling, and it's just pure chaos outside.

UNKNOWN (voice-over): Where did that go?

UNKNOWN (voice-over): I have no clue.

OLSON: And then at one point, we hear this really loud boom.

UNKNOWN (voice-over): The whole building just completely shook. Oh, my God. The whole wall is gone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Joining us now to discuss is storm chaser Max Olson. Max, that looks so scary. Where were you filming that from, all that video that you got? Where were you? yeah so that was hurricane Harvey we were in Rockport Texas which was where the storm

OLSON: Yeah, so, that was Hurricane Harvey. We were in Rockport, Texas which was where the storm initially made landfall, so where the strongest winds were. A lot of people know Harvey from the rain it dumped in Houston, but that initial landfall point was Rockport, Texas, and we were in a hotel which was unfortunately coming apart all around us.

CAMEROTA: So, you were inside taking that video?

OLSON: Correct, yeah, we were inside of a hotel. A lot of storm chasers and media personnel all kind of congregated there. It seemed like it was the most suitable structure in the area, but this storm just kept getting stronger and stronger as it approached really strong Category 4 and it started tearing off the roof and the walls, and that's what you saw there in that clip, was the wall failing.

CAMEROTA: I mean, as a storm chaser, are you ever really scared?

OLSON: I would say that's actually probably one of the scariest moments I've had. That was our first major hurricane that we had make land fall in the United States and over a decade, so a lot of us didn't know exactly what to expect, and then to have the building that we thought would be, you know, a suitable shelter start coming down around us. I was pretty terrified. Thankfully, something like that hasn't happened since.

(LAUGHTER)

CAMEROTA: Yeah, no kidding, but, I mean, how do you know how close you can get to these storms?

OLSON: Hurricanes are unique because I also chase tornadoes. I chase all sorts of types of, you know, extreme weather. And tornadoes, you can very easily go in and out of the path of when you know, you know, when you've had a lot of experience. It's actually pretty difficult to get yourself in a bad situation. Hurricanes, you're placing yourselves right in the -- in the direct path of this monster storm and once you're there, you're there.

So, it's -- it has just been years of trial and error. And thankfully, we only had really that one particular incident where something went wrong. We were okay but most of the time, I feel relatively in control because we do a lot of planning before these storms.

So, we have all the -- all the gear that we could potentially need to survive for -- for weeks on end, and then after that, it's just, you know, making the best decision in the moment to still get the shot, still get something, you know, dramatic but not put ourselves in a deadly situation.

CAMEROTA: Well, that's good to hear. I mean, I'm glad that a lot of preparation goes into it. But mother nature always has the last word. So, stay safe. Thanks so much for sharing your experience in video with us. Really appreciate talking to you.

OLSON: Absolutely.

CAMEROTA: And tune in to the all-new episode of "Violent Earth with Live Schreiber." It airs tonight at 9:00 Eastern and Pacific, only on CNN.

All right, coral reefs are dying off at an alarming rate. In today's "Start Small, Think Big," we visit a farm on Grand Bahama that's striving to restore the reefs beneath the waves by growing coral on land.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SIMON DIXON, CORAL VITA: Welcome to Coral Vita. We are a coral restoration facility and our aim is to be the first for-profit company within restoration. We see that as leveraging a brand-new industry. We can generate revenue by completing contracts, and then that money can be put back into the business to push science forward.

What we'll do is we'll take one of these corals and then we turn them into micro fragments. So, by cutting them, essentially, what we're doing is we're encouraging faster growth than we would normally see from a larger parent colony.

[17:55:01]

And we're looking for it to cover this plug before we then move it on to our next phase which is placing it onto a cookie. That way, they'll communicate together and will actually fuse onto the cookie, creating a much larger coral mass.

So, the benefit of a land-based farm is obviously the degree of control that we have over the environment so that we can provide the corals with exactly what they need to, yeah, to facilitate that fast growth that we're looking for.

So, in a little under a year, this particular species of coral has gone from the ocean through the micro fragmenting and is now ready to go back to the reef. Our hope behind that is to obviously be able to push restoration forward and make a real difference in a much shorter time frame than we believe is currently possible.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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