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Supreme Court's Trump Immunity Ruling; Top Democrats Back Biden Amid Calls for Him to Drop Out; Hurricane Beryl Hits Category 5, Roars Toward Jamaica; France Gears Up for Second Round After Far-Right Tops First; Released Palestinian Detainees Detail Torture in Israeli Jails. Aired 4-4:30a ET
Aired July 02, 2024 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:00:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Supreme Court partially siding with former President Donald Trump, ruling that former presidents are entitled to some immunity from prosecution for official actions.
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Today's decision almost certainly means that there are virtually no limits on what a president can do.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hurricane Beryl makes landfall in the Windward Islands.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is total devastation. Total, total devastation.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A long-hoped-for reunion after months in detention. Forced, they say, to face unspeakable horrors in Israeli detention.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: Live from London, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Max Foster.
MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, a warm welcome to our viewers joining us from around the world. I'm Max Foster. It's Tuesday, July 2nd, 9 a.m. here in London, 4 a.m. in Washington, where there's growing outrage over the Supreme Court's controversial ruling on presidential immunity, a decision which could allow Donald Trump to escape accountability in his ongoing criminal cases.
The 6-3 ruling says Trump may claim immunity from criminal prosecution for all his official acts, including some of the actions he took before leaving office. All the justices on the top row backed his immunity argument. Three of them, Brett Kavanaugh, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett, were appointed by Trump himself.
Joe Biden warns this sets a dangerous precedent because presidents aren't kings and no-one's above the law. The president took aim at the Supreme Court over its series of inflammatory decisions.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This decision today has continued the court's attack in recent years on a wide range of long- established legal principles in our nation. From gutting voting rights and civil rights to taking away a woman's right to choose, to today's decision that undermines the rule of law of this nation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Meanwhile, Trump is hailing the ruling as a big win for the Constitution and for democracy. CNN's Paula Reid picks up the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Presidents have to be given total immunity. They have to be allowed to do their job.
PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Supreme Court partially siding with former President Donald Trump in his ongoing January 6th case, ruling that former presidents are entitled to some immunity from prosecution for official actions, but not for private conduct. In the 6-3 opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts writing for the majority.
At least with respect to the president's exercise of his core constitutional powers, this immunity must be absolute. The president enjoys no immunity for his unofficial acts and not everything the president does is official. The president is not above the law.
The high court, though, leaving it up to lower courts to determine which actions are official and therefore immune.
Roberts writing: Other allegations, such as those involving Trump's interactions with the vice president, state officials and certain private parties and his comments to the general public present more difficult questions.
Meaning District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is overseeing Trump's January 6th case, will need to decide whether Trump's pressure campaign to get Vice President Pence --
TRUMP: If Mike Pence does the right thing, we win the election.
REID (voice-over): -- Georgia state officials --
TRUMP: I just want to find 11,780 votes. Which is one more than we have, because we won the state.
REID (voice-over): -- and others to overturn the 2020 election results were official acts. Trump celebrating the decision on social media, posting: Big win for our constitution and democracy.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissenting from the majority opinion, writing: The relationship between the president and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably in every use of official power. The president is now a king above the law.
Something she and other liberal justices warned about during oral arguments in April.
JUDGE KETANJI BROWN JACKSON, ASSOCIATE JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT: I'm trying to understand what the disincentive is from turning the Oval Office into, you know, the seat of criminal activity in this country.
[04:05:02]
REID (voice-over): The decision likely to hamstring special counsel Jack Smith's election subversion case.
JACK SMITH, SPECIAL COUNSEL FOR U.S. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT: Charging Donald J. Trump with conspiring to defraud the United States.
REID (voice-over): Roberts making clear in his majority opinion that Trump's discussions with Justice Department officials and his official conversations with the then vice president are immune. And in another blow for Smith, Robert says Trump's official acts cannot be considered even as evidence at trial. A trial in this case, though, now highly unlikely before the November election.
REID: Sources tell CNN that Trump's legal team intends to use this opinion to attack other cases Trump is facing, including the Mar-a- Lago classified documents prosecution and his recent conviction in New York. They will likely use this opinion to argue that portions of Hope Hicks's testimony, as well as tweets that were introduced as evidence, should be tossed out. It's unclear if that will be enough to upend that conviction, but it will clearly keep Trump's lawyers busy over the next few months.
Paula Reid, CNN, the Supreme Court.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: The dissent listed examples of when a president would apparently be immune from prosecution, including ordering the military to kill a political rival or ordering a coup to hang onto power. Attorney and legal expert Areva Martin shared her take on the Supreme Court decision.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AREVA MARTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: What we've seen from this court is a willingness. The 6-3 majority conservative court, a court that was carefully, carefully curated by Donald Trump when he was in office, is willing to stretch the boundaries of the law in order to, in many ways, advance a Republican agenda, a conservative agenda. Donald Trump brags about the fact that he hand-selected these justices so that they could do exactly what they're doing, which is delivered to him win after win after win. You have to look at this case in the context of what happened on Friday when this court essentially said a federal obstruction statute could not be used to prosecute those individuals who we witnessed with our very eyes a storm and break into the Capitol, those insurrectionists. Also, another victory for Donald Trump and those who have been held accountable for their conduct on January 6th.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Well, U.S. House Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is seeking articles of impeachment against Supreme Court justices.
She wrote on X: The Supreme Court has become consumed by a corruption crisis beyond its control. She added that the ruling represents an assault on American democracy. It's up to Congress to defend our nation from this authoritarian capture. I intend on filing articles of impeachment upon our return.
Ocasio-Cortez didn't say which justices would be impeached. But her references to corruption align with Democratic allegations against Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas.
Now, President Joe Biden is considering a high profile interview in the coming days to help prove his fitness for office. Meanwhile, according to his advisers, the campaign is trying to reassure Democrats after Mr. Biden's lackluster debate performance last week. Top Democrats are mostly sticking by the president. But there are talks behind closed doors that things could change. CNN's MJ Lee reports.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm with Joe Biden.
REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), FORMER U.S. HOUSE SPEAKER: It's not about performance in terms of a debate. It's about performance in a presidency.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They have confidence in Joe Biden. They think he's our strongest candidate.
MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Democrats are in full crisis mode.
BIDEN: Dealing with everything we have to do with. Look, if we finally beat Medicare --
LEE (voice-over): On the heels of President Biden's poor debate performance against Donald Trump, Democrats gravely concerned about what comes next for their party.
REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD): There are very honest and serious and rigorous conversations taking place at every level of our party.
LEE (voice-over): While the president and his campaign are fighting for survival. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Joe, you did such a great job.
LEE (voice-over): Huddled at Camp David over the weekend, the president's family giving him their unequivocal support.
JILL BIDEN, U.S. FIRST LADY: There is no one that I would rather have sitting in the Oval Office right now than my husband.
LEE (voice-over): The first lady telling Vogue magazine that the family will not let those 90 minutes define the four years he's been president. The Biden clan undeniably frustrated with the president's senior aides in the fallout of the CNN debate and privately discussing whether any advisers should be fired.
BIDEN: I don't speak as smoothly as I used to. I don't debate as well as I used to.
LEE (voice-over): Top campaign officials and party leaders fielding a flurry of worried phone calls and public criticism pouring in from lawmakers, surrogates and donors. But for now, insisting the president is staying put.
[04:10:00]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Joe Biden is not going to take himself out of this race, nor should he.
LEE (voice-over): But the next stretch of day is crucial for the president's political future. The Biden team is collecting and awaiting polling and research to get a fuller sense of the post-debate damage. One Democratic congressman telling CNN that Congress is the party's so-called firewall and suggesting that if data comes out showing Biden is not just going to lose the presidency, but he's going to lose the House, then the dam will likely break, prompting Democratic officials to publicly call for a plan B.
REP. JIM CLYBURN (D-SC): I do not believe that Joe Biden has a problem leading for the next four years because he's done a great job of leading for the last three and a half years.
LEE (voice-over): Amid the panic, the campaign doing its best to spin last week's presidential debate to their advantage, namely pointing to the 90 minute faceoff as showing Donald Trump's true colors.
BIDEN: I know I'm not a young man, but I know how to do this job. I know right from wrong. I know how to tell the truth. And I know like millions of Americans know, when you get knocked down, you get back up.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Now, Hurricane Beryl has strengthened into a category five storm and has winds of 270 kilometers per hour as it speeds across the Caribbean towards Jamaica. It's the earliest ever category five storm in the Atlantic Ocean, driven by extreme heat and rising water temperatures. The U.S. National Hurricane Center calls Beryl potentially catastrophic and says it's expected to bring life threatening winds and storm surge to Jamaica starting Wednesday.
The storm made devastating landfall across the Windward Islands on Monday, knocking out power and destroying homes. Parts of St. Vincent and the Grenadines have so -- have no water or power, and at least one person was reported killed there. The prime minister of Grenada says Carriacou, the country's second largest island, was flattened in half an hour.
CNN meteorologist Chad Myers has more.
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CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Really, I mean, very few storms in the world have ever made me speechless. But this, in the beginning of July, where you see the Hurricane Hunter flying through the stadium, there's the middle of the eye, you can see the sky. But then all of a sudden now he's flying into the eye wall, the most violent part of the storm that was earlier today.
Hurricane warnings not posted for Jamaica. Tropical storm warnings posted for parts of Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Whether it's a near miss or not, there is going to be winds out there that do get the hurricane force, do get the tropical storm force.
Here's how rare this storm is. The average date of the first major hurricane on record for any year is September 1st. It's what, July 2nd?
We are a full two months ahead because the water is really two months ahead of time. We are going to see wind through the Caribbean. The good news is right here through this stripe, there's nothing except water.
But when it gets closer to Jamaica and really could even get closer to the Yucatan Peninsula, in this water, upper 80s, middle 80s, with waves now being reported by NOAA, at 42 feet, there will still be consequences whether you're near that eye or not, especially with the waves, possible surge. There's a lot going on here and this storm really only started about 48 hours ago or so. And here's where we are right now.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Well, this just into CNN. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban is visiting Ukraine today, his first since Russia invaded in February 2022. His spokesperson says he plans to discuss European peace with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Mr. Orban is known for his close relationship with the Russian President Vladimir Putin. He's repeatedly tried to steamroll EU initiatives for offering further military and financial support to Ukraine during the war. We'll keep across it.
Now a warning from the French Prime Minister after the far right leads the first round of parliamentary elections. A look at his comments and what the second round of voting could bring. Plus, a group of Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli jails are
detailing the harsh conditions that they faced inside. Their heartbreaking story next.
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FOSTER: A pivotal week ahead for France where political deal making is expected ahead of the second round of parliamentary elections. The far right took the lead in the first round, prompting rivals to seek a united front in hopes of preventing them from reaching an absolute majority. Most candidates elected in the first round represent National Rally and its allies.
Projections show the far right party could win as many as 280 seats in the lower house after the second round on Sunday. Today marks the deadline for candidates to confirm whether they'll compete. France's current Prime Minister is issuing a warning ahead of the decisive vote.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GABRIEL ATTAL, FRENCH PRIME MINISTER (through translator): Quite sincerely, the stakes are so high for the French that I'm secondary in all this. What I want is to avoid the RN having an absolute majority because I sincerely believe that would be catastrophic for the French, for our pensioners and their savings. And I want a National Assembly where our candidates carry enough weight to protect the French people from the disastrous projects that have been put forward in this campaign.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: CNN's Melissa Bell has more now from Paris.
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MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Jubilation mixed with disbelief. France's far right supporters celebrating their historic win. The long controversial party's lead in the first round of parliamentary elections. But that was hardly surprising given the National Rally's victory in European elections last month.
HELENE CONWAY-MOURET, FRENCH SENATOR, SOCIALIST PARTY: When I saw the figures yesterday of people voting, I kind of felt, well, you know, they do not want the extreme right. But in fact, it's a vote that has been consolidated from the three weeks ago, the European elections where we thought maybe it was just a message. No, it's not a message. It's an actual movement.
BELL (voice-over): Marine Le Pen's party held just 88 seats in parliament before Macron called the snap elections.
[04:20:00] Now it leads the votes, securing outright 38 seats in the first round with projections showing that it leads the race in more than half of 501 seats that are up for grabs in the second round.
The far right now poised for a parliamentary majority with the remaining question of whether or not it will be absolute. And with that, whether the 28-year-old Jordan Bardella will become the next prime minister.
JORDAN BARDELLA, NATIONAL RALLY PRESIDENT (through translator): I'm the only one in this election who can talk about the substance and the day-to-day concerns of the French people, purchasing power, security and immigration.
BELL (voice-over): But it is on France's relationship with the rest of the world that some of the biggest questions arise. In particular, what a far-right French government would mean for Europe and for Ukraine.
DONALD TUSK, POLISH PRIME MINISTER (through translator): This is all really starting to smell of great danger. Not only the results of the first round of the French elections, but also the information about Russian influence and Russian services, many parts of the radical right in Europe.
BELL (voice-over): Long seen as a fringe party, considered too toxic by some to be electable, its move to center stage has led to calls for the country to unite against it ahead of this Sunday's second round of voting. Which will see an unprecedented number of races between three candidates representing the far right, the left-wing New Popular Front Alliance, which came second, and Emmanuel Macron's centrist Ensemble Coalition.
Within that coalition, the Renaissance Party, eight years after it was created, looks set to be the main victim of an election its founder never even had to call.
Melissa Bell, CNN, Paris.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: After war in Gaza nears ten months, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says his forces are close to eliminating Hamas in the territory.
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BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER (through translator): We are advancing to the end of the phase of eliminating the terrorist army of Hamas, and there will be a continuation to strike its remnants.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Prime Minister Netanyahu also said he visited his Gaza division on Sunday and saw very considerable achievements in the fighting in Rafah. Before launching the military operation in Rafah in May, Israeli leaders had said that the southern Gaza city was the last stronghold of Hamas. Israel has ordered residents in several parts of Khan Younis to evacuate immediately after rockets were fired from the area towards Israel. Residents say they received audio messages from Israeli phone numbers on Monday asking them to leave.
Dozens of Palestinians released from Israeli prison on Monday are describing the horror that they faced whilst in custody. They say they were accused, abused rather, and subjected to near-daily torture with very little to eat.
CNN's Nada Bashir has more.
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NADA BASHIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A long-hoped-for reunion after months in detention, removed from Israel's devastating military onslaught on Gaza, forced instead, they say, to face unspeakable horrors in Israeli detention.
We were being tortured in ways I cannot describe, Faraj says. Only God knows what we have been through. I swear to you, it was the kind of torture nobody can speak of.
Overwhelmed, it is almost too painful for him to account.
They play with your emotions, he says. They would show us photos of our relatives' bodies, pictures of our families and children, and say, look at your children, we killed them. They would show us pictures of our wives, our sisters, and tell us that they had taken them and done this and that to them.
For Faraj's daughter, her father's safe return is all that she has been praying for.
I'm very happy, she says. Never in my life have I been without him, not once in seven years.
Inside, the relatives of those released on Monday frantically call loved ones to share the news.
They told him they had killed us all. He still can't believe we're all alive, this woman says.
On Monday, Israel's prison service said that it was not aware of these claims, adding that all prisoners are detained according to the law, and that all basic rights required are fully applied by professionally trained prison guards.
The Israeli security officials have previously told CNN that they have been made aware of torture tactics being used against Palestinians within Israel's prison system and are investigating.
Some 50 Palestinian detainees were released by Israeli authorities on Monday. Why they were originally detained, we may never know. CNN's inquiries to Israeli authorities went unanswered. [04:25:00]
Among them, the director of Gaza's largest hospital, al-Shifa, released more than seven months after Israeli forces first raided the hospital and detained him.
We were beaten and tortured almost every day. My little finger was broken, and I was repeatedly struck across the head, causing me to bleed several times, Dr. Abu Salmiya says. The torture taking place in Israel's prisons is near daily.
The decision to release Palestinian detainees has sparked fierce backlash among some Israeli officials. Top ministers were reportedly out of the loop, and everyone from the opposition leader to the far- right security minister called it dysfunction and national security malpractice. But the Israel Security Agency, or Shin Bet, says it was forced to release some detainees due to a shortage in prison space.
Whatever the reason, Monday's reunions were a moment of relief for many families in Gaza. Mahmoud Ali Baida (ph) says he was detained for more than eight months in Israeli prison.
Look at my legs, he says. They wouldn't give us anything to treat our rashes.
Many have spoken of the little food and water they received while in detention. Others say they were denied medication, including insulin for diabetes.
For a month and a half, I was blindfolded, handcuffed and forced to kneel, Wael Mansour (ph) says, highlighting the deep scars left on his wrists. A permanent reminder of all that he and so many others have been forced to endure.
Nada Bashir, CNN, London.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: CNN asked the Israeli Security Agency, Shin Bet, about those allegations, but didn't receive a reply.
Senior U.S. officials are imploring the Taliban to include women in all aspects of public life. They attended a U.N. conference in Doha focused on Afghanistan. One U.N. official says the country cannot return to the international fold until women play a role in its future. This is the third Doha conference of its kind and the first time Taliban representatives have attended. Here's what a U.S. State Department spokesperson said about the meetings.
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VEDANT PATEL, U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT DEPUTY SPOKESPERSON: Special Representative Tom West and Special Envoy Rina Amiri are attending these U.N. convened meetings in Doha on Afghanistan this week. Along with closest allies, dozens of countries and international organizations and others are present. At a session at the Doha III Conference on the Economy, Special Rep
West and Special Envoy Amiri also made clear that the Afghan economy cannot grow while half the population's rights are not respected.
It is well known that the Taliban's policies are robbing the Afghan economy of over a billion dollars per year in GDP.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Well, still ahead, the case has featured accusations of a vast police cover-up and investigative misconduct, what a judge has declared in Karen Read's murder trial.
Plus, Kenyans are burying their dead after dozens are killed in government protests. More on their push to hold police and officials accountable when we return.
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