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Trump, Harris Focus On Battleground States As Race Enters Critical Phase; How A Debunked Rumor Made It From Social Media To The Presidential Debate; Police Release Dispatch And 911 Calls From Winder, Georgia, School Shooting; Miami Dolphins' QB Tua Tagovailoa's Football Future Uncertain After Third Concussion; How NFL Kickoff Rule Change May Reduce Football Head Injuries; Inside One Of Ukraine's Lifesaving Hospital Trains; Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson On Raising An Autistic Child. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired September 14, 2024 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:40]

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: All right, hello, again, everyone. Thank you so much for joining me. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. And we begin this hour with the race for the White House, entering another critical phase.

Vice President Kamala Harris continues to try to build on her momentum out of Tuesday's presidential debate. She's wrapped up a pair of rallies in the swing state of Pennsylvania where she campaigned in rural Republican leaning counties. Tonight, Harris will speak at an award ceremony for the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation in Washington, D.C. She's also launching a new campaign to mobilize Latino voters.

For more on these developments. Let's bring in CNN's Eva McKend.

Eva, the vice president gave an interview to a television station in Philadelphia before wrapping up her visit there in Pennsylvania. So what did she have to say?

EVA MCKEND, CNN NATIONAL POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fred, one of the most interesting takeaway from that interview was the way that the vice president talked about courting Republican voters I think to the frustration some on the left. This is a very intentional effort of the campaign to play up the Cheney endorsement, to essentially argue to these Republicans, they are welcomed into the fold.

Take a listen to how the vice president is thinking about this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS (D), VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: In my heart, I know in my soul, I know that the vast majority of us as Americans have so much more in common than what separates us. Most Americans want a leader who brings us together as Americans and not someone who professes to be a leader who is trying to have us point our fingers at each other. I think people are exhausted with that approach.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCKEND: And Fred, this is perhaps no surprise. One of the early acts of the Harris campaign was to launch Republicans for Harris. They're also going to be traveling to more rural counties and communities. Counties that they may not necessarily be able to win outright but to still illustrate to those voters that they want their support. Counties like -- excuse me Cambria County in Pennsylvania, where the vice president was on Friday.

And so this is all part of the strategy, Fredricka, to bring these Republicans into fold, to not only try to appeal to diehard Democratic voters, but to other voters, bring them into the coalition as well.

WHITFIELD: Right. And among those that she and her campaign are trying to bring into the coalition are more Latino voters. And so there's a new campaign that she's launching. What's that all about?

MCKEND: Yes. So there's a big push on Spanish language radio, a $3 million investment there. And then she's also going to lean on influential radio personalities. They believed that that is the best way to capture that part of the electorate -- Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. Eva McKend, thank you so much.

All right. This week, the mayor of Springfield, Ohio, issued a public plea saying, quote, "We need help not hate." This as former president Donald Trump doubles down on a baseless claim that Haitian immigrants are eating pets. And we're now seeing the real life impact that Trump's words are having on the Haitian community there. On Thursday, Springfield city hall was forced to close due to a bomb threat. On Friday, elementary schools there were evacuated for a second straight day because of threats.

So how did this debunked rumor make its way into Trump's remarks on the debate stage? According to the apolitical fact-checking organization News Guard, it appears to have started with a single post on a private Springfield, Ohio, Facebook page. And in it, the poster claims their neighbor's daughter's friend's missing cat was found butchered, ready to be eaten by Haitian immigrants. The poster says they've been told that this is also happening to dogs, ducks and geese.

Well, there's more. It's not clear when the post was made, but on September 5th just days before the presidential debate, it went viral on X and within days and without any further proof Elon Musk and vice presidential candidate Senator J.D. Vance were repeating it. So did other Republican politicians like Senator Ted Cruz and Congressman Jim Jordan and Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene.

[15:05:08]

Neo-Nazis were also a key driver in amplifying the rumor. For months hate groups like Blood Tribe had been spreading hateful rhetoric about Haitian immigrants in Springfield. And early this summer they carried rifles and swastikas as they marched through downtown Springfield. And last month, Springfield's mayor, rather, had police remove a member of Blood Tribe from a city commission meeting.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NATHANIEL HIGGINS, MEMBER, NEO-NAZI GROUP "BLOOD TRIBE": I come to bring a word of warning. Stop what you're doing before it's too late. Crime and savagery will only increase with every Haitian you bring in. And with it, public frustration and anger --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You sound threatening to me. You sound threatening to me. I'm going to have --

HIGGINS: Based on the comments tonight --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If I could ask the police to go ahead and --

HIGGINS: -- I'm sure I don't need to tell you that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It just sounds threatening if you go ahead and just peacefully be removed.

HIGGINS" These people didn't ask for this and they deserve better than to have to put up with violent and unruly outsiders --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you so much. You're done. Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Five days. That's all it took for a private Facebook post to go from Twitter to a former president Donald Trump repeating it on a global stage.

Joining me to talk about this and other developments, Larry Sabato. He is the founder and director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia and he is the editor of the book, "Return to Normalcy? The 2020 Election That Almost Broke America."

Larry, great to see you.

LARRY SABATO, FOUNDER AND DIRECTOR, UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA CENTER FOR POLITICS: Nice to see you, Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. So I know that was -- you know, that was quite the journey that a rumor took and has caused significant damage and disruption in that community and beyond in so many ways. So, you know, why does the former president keep spewing lies, you know, this information that is so continuously to be so damaging?

SABATO: Because it excites his base. There's no issue like the border for them, even more than inflation. I think the border issue, immigration generally, gets them up and raring to go and determined to reelect Donald Trump. And that is all that matters, frankly, to Donald Trump. We live partly because of Trump.

We live in the post-factual era in which facts don't longer matter, Fred. They don't matter. Whatever you can say, whatever people want to take in, even if you present them with volumes of evidence that it isn't true or it was made up, I'm thinking of the big lie about voter fraud, it's OK because it serves a larger partisan purpose. It supports the candidate they want to win, and the end justifies the means. Boy, we've made a lot of progress in human history, but we haven't made any progress at all.

WHITFIELD: And he's also doing it because somehow it is beneficial to him. Is that support growing?

SABATO: I don't think it's growing. I think the question is whether or not he can maintain the level of determination and energy that his border police, in a sense, in his coalition have generated over the years because at this point I don't think it's very likely at all Donald Trump is going to attract new voters, or that he's going to expand his coalition. His chance of being elected again depends entirely on his coalition, his supporters turning out in very large numbers. And this is what gets their motor running.

WHITFIELD: So, while Trump is also, you know, attacking migrants, immigrants, he's also coming under fire from some of his most staunch supporters for campaigning with far-right conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer. She is someone who has claimed 9/11 was an inside job, posted a racist tweet about Kamala Harris this week. She's been seen, you know, getting on and getting off his plane on his, you know, campaign stops.

So -- and he's trying to say, look, he's not necessarily advocating everything that she has to say. She's a strong person. She has her own beliefs. That's the closest he's coming to either condemning or condoning her.

SABATO: Well, he's obviously been maintaining his association with her and including her on his plane and making public appearances with her has legitimized at least to a certain degree, I think a substantial degree, the wacky things that she has said over the years. This is not new, Fred. He has done this since he came on the public scene.

[15:10:02]

He has appeared with far-right conspiratorial people, some of which he has endorsed on, first, Twitter and then Truth Social, and of course, he has an ally on at least some things with Elon Musk. You know, if you do it over and over and you pay no penalty for it, and in fact, you gain from it politically, if you're like Donald Trump, you're very inclined to do it again and again and again.

WHITFIELD: OK. Meantime, his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, she's been campaigning in Republican leaning counties in battleground states, you know, as she reaches out to swing voters, and she's also launching this campaign to mobilize Latino voters.

What do you make of her strategy and her efforts to grow support?

SABATO: This is so important and Democrats have not done it to the extent they should have for a long time. They ignore the rural areas, and they'll say, well, there are not that many votes there. We're going to go hunting where the ducks are, meaning they want to maximize their vote in suburbs and urban areas. That's fine. Maximize your vote. But you can also help your cause enormously just by showing voters you're interested in what they think and you want to help them with their problems.

And when you go into these rural areas, you're not going to win them. As you were saying a few minutes ago, your correspondent was, they're not going to win them. They know they're not going to win him. But what they can do is instead of losing them by 50 points, they could lose them by 45 points. And you say, well, that's pointless. No, it isn't. When you add up those extra votes in all those small rural localities, it actually enhances your chances for victory.

WHITFIELD: Larry Sabato, we'll leave it there for now. Thank you so much. From the University of Virginia.

SABATO: Thank you, Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. We're following new developments in the investigation into last week's deadly high school shooting in Winder, Georgia. What 911 calls and radio communications are revealing about the chilling moments the rampage unfolded.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: All right. New details in the Georgia high school shooting. Barrow County officials have released the police 911 calls and more than 500 radio messages between emergency personnel from the day of the shooting. A tearful call from the suspect's aunt was among the recordings. She called authorities saying she was worried the shooter was her nephew.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK. And you said that you've got a message from your nephew?

ANNIE BROWN, COLT GRAY'S AUNT: No. My mom just called me and said that Colt text his mom, my sister and his dad that he was sorry, and they called the school and told the counselor to go get him immediately. And then she said she saw there's been a shooting. And I just worry it was him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: That is tough to hear. People in the Winder community are gathering today to remember two of the four people killed in last week's rampage at Apalachee High School. The families of 14-year-old student Mason Schermerhorn and math teacher Christina Irimie are holding separate funeral services.

CNN's Rafael Romo is joining me now with more on this.

So those 911 calls, they're giving us a clearer picture, you know, about what happened just preceding and during the act.

RAFAEL ROMO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. Those details, and let me tell you, have been looking into that, it is very disturbing. It is very hard to hear, especially for people in Barrow County. And as you mentioned before, those two victims are being laid to rest today and the two remaining ones will be so in the next couple of weeks or so.

Mason Schermerhorn and Cristina Irimie were among the four people killed in the shooting at the school in Winder on September 4th. On Friday, the Barrow County Sheriff's Office released the 911 calls and more than 500 radio messages between emergency personnel during and right after the shooting. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's a shooter.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Active shooter.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have an active shooter at Apalachee High School.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One suspect in custody.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's the status of the shooter?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In custody and uninjured.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMO: Computer-aided dispatch reports show the first call for the shooting came in at 10:22 a.m. Eastern Time, according to dispatch reports obtained from the Barrow County Sheriff's Office through a Freedom of Information request made by CNN. Two minutes later at 10:24 a.m. authorities have the suspect's name as Colt and one student was dead according to the reports. At 10:30 a.m. the suspect was in custody, not injured.

And then at 11:45 a.m. a woman who identified herself as Colt Gray's aunt made a tearful 911 call saying she was afraid her 14-year-old nephew was involved in the shooting. This is part of what she told the dispatcher.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Hey, my mom just text me and said that my nephew texted his mom and dad this morning and told them that he was really sorry.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK.

BROWN: And he goes to the high school Apalachee.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMO: Very hard to hear. And Barrow County Sheriff Jud Smith said in an interview with CNN affiliate WXIA, the AR-15 style rifle used in the shooting was hidden in Gray's backpack when he left home for school that morning as well as the bullets he was going to use. [15:20:07]

Colt Gray, who authorities say confessed to the Winder high school attack, is charged with four counts of felony murder and will be tried as an adult. His attorney declined to comment Wednesday when reached by phone.

Now, school administrators are planning for a gradual reopening of Apalachee High School the week of September 23rd, but let me tell you, Fred, last week I was talking to some of those students, it's really going to be hard for them to go back.

WHITFIELD: Yes. Of course.

ROMO: They say they associate that place with so much trauma after what they experienced.

WHITFIELD: They're going to be reliving every minute. I mean, that's understandable.

All right. Rafael Romo, thanks so much. Appreciate it.

All right. The Miami Dolphins head coach pumps the brakes on retirement talk for quarterback Tua Tagovailoa after he suffered another concussion. What's next for the QB as he and the team faced questions about his condition and his NFL future.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:25:24]

WHITFIELD: Miami Dolphins head coach on Friday said he is more focused on Tua Tagovailoa's well-being than the team's future after the star quarterback suffered another scary head injury in Thursday night's game.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE MCDANIEL, HEAD COACH, MIAMI DOLPHINS: I'm not assessing the injury through the lens of like, all right, so what does this mean for him playing? I know the facts are that it's important that he gets healthy day by day and in that the actual -- the best thing I can do is not try to assess what this even means from a football standpoint.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Tagovailoa is in the league's concussion protocol after the hit which sent his body into a so-called fencing response with his arm extended and hand clinched. He has been diagnosed with three concussions in his NFL career. And now many voices across the league say he should walk away from the game.

My next guest understands this both on and off the field. Joining me a right now is Dr. Myron Rolle, a neurosurgery resident with Harvard Medical School. He is also a former safety with the NFL's Pittsburgh Steelers and Tennessee Titans. Dr. Raul, great to see you.

DR. MYRON ROLLE, NEUROSURGERY RESIDENT, HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL: Thank you. Thanks for having me.

WHITFIELD: So this video, it's hard to watch every time, isn't it? And I wonder when you saw that impact and Tagovailoa's response, his body response. What became your medical opinion?

ROLLE: Well, I was very disturbed and concerned like anyone. I mean, when he had his concussions a couple of years ago, the subsequent ones back-to-back, he had similar sort of fencing posturing that he displayed this past week. And so I just -- I saw someone who's brain had been through some trauma before and now experiencing this next concussion. It was very difficult to see and hopefully he's getting the right treatment necessary for him to be healthy going forward, even devoid of football at this point.

WHITFIELD: Yes. Would it be your recommendation that he continue playing?

ROLLE: My recommendation would be that he not continue to play. And that's not seeing any CT scan or MRIs, doing a physical exam on him, but knowing that once you get one concussion, you have an exponentially high rates of getting another concussion. Now he's had three or maybe even four at this point. It's very dangerous. The sport is dangerous at baseline.

And to subject yourself to potential post-concussion symptoms where insomnia, photophobia, cognitive decline, (INAUDIBLE), and even maybe even seizures, these are things that can really disrupt his life going forward. And it can be difficult for me as a young man with a long life to live and I hope he takes the considerations of people like myself, neurosurgeons, and others very seriously.

WHITFIELD: Yes. And you know this firsthand, you know, that you're a neurosurgeon, but also with your NFL career and everything preceding the NFL. College play, high school play, all of that stuff makes a difference, too. And like you said, as we know, Tagovailoa has had three concussions that we know of, at least in the NFL, you know. And I wonder, if you could help people understand a little bit more about what is happening to the brain with hits like the one we saw, you know, this week, or even like the one we saw last season when, I mean, that was a very alarming concussion and his body response to that moment as well.

ROLLE: It's a great question. You know, the skull at this age -- I'm a pediatric neurosurgery fellow at John Hopkins and so I deal with a lot of children, but for someone like Tua who's got this fixed skull and has brain that sort of sits suspended in cerebral spinal fluid, the brain can shift and move with translational force. Somebody directing a blow and exerting pressure and force on the brain or rotational force.

People who have car accidents or have been shaken, that whiplash effect in a brain sort of rattles in their skull. So it takes contusions, it takes breaks, there are sort of microhemorrhages that had been the issue and the interesting thing is that you cannot see concussions from normal radiographic pictures. You can't see it from CT or MRIs. So it's difficult to diagnose from that standpoint. You have to go with clinical symptoms.

And sometimes these people have different symptoms. Sometimes there are six or seven symptoms, sometimes a one or two. And so every person that be individually sort of managed, and that's why it's hard to sort of figure it out.

[15:30:01]

But for Tua, we've seen it. We know he has symptoms. He had some gait sort of abnormalities before. I'm not sure what he's going through at this particular point, but for someone so young, someone playing a very violent and aggressive sport like football and playing a position like quarterback, where you're subjected to these hard hits from very grown and difficult players, it's time to really take a strong look at your life as a human, as a man, as a leader, going forward without football being a part of that equation.

WHITFIELD: Wow. And Doctor, there's so much more to talk about. I would love for you to watch this report from our Dr. Sanjay Gupta, you know, about a particular avenue to help avert serious injuries on the football field, and then I want to get your point of view. So let's watch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): What you're watching is perhaps the most dangerous play in football.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five yards deep out of the end zone.

GUPTA: The kickoff return.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Down the sideline.

DR. ALLEN SILLS, CHIEF MEDICAL OFFICER, NFL: It's space and speed. So if you think about where we're standing here, you've got players that are lined up, in this case maybe 50, 60 yards away from where we are. They're running down the field as fast as they can possibly run. So coming down the field at speed and then having collisions obviously

is a driver for injury.

GUPTA: The NFL says last season concussions occurred four times more often on a kickoff than any other play. It's exactly why Riverdale Country School in the Bronx wants to change the game.

JOHN PIZZI, ATHLETIC DIRECTOR, RIVERDALE COUNTRY SCHOOL: I sort of jokingly said to him, like, I want to change football in America. Like, we need to figure this out.

GUPTA: Want to change football in America. It's pretty audacious.

PIZZI: Yes, I don't know if I actually realized what I was saying at the time.

GUPTA (voice-over): John Pizzi is the school's athletic director.

PIZZI: Yes, so, in 2018, we had 18 players left for the last game of our season. We had a bunch of concussions and a bunch of season-ending injuries. So we made a decision to cancel our last game. But when that season ended, we had to figure out how we were going to manage the next football season.

GUPTA: So, together with the Concussion Legacy Foundation, they proposed something pretty radical, getting rid of the sport's most iconic play, no more kickoffs, no more returns. The beginning of their games now look like this. Play just starts at the 35-yard line. And so far, Pizzi says they've seen a 33 percent decrease in concussions across the league, and importantly an 18 percent increase in participation.

Parents certainly liked the idea and it turns out so do the players. Like team captain Tristan Cornell.

TRISTAN CORNELL, CAPTAIN, RIVERDALE COUNTRY SCHOOL VARSITY FOOTBALL TEAM: I have talked to people. When I tell them that my school doesn't do kickoffs, they're like, oh, my gosh. That's one of the biggest parts of the game. How can you not do that? But then I see all these injuries that happen from kickoffs, so the fact that we don't have that probably allows us to keep healthy and play throughout the entire season.

SILLS: It's a fascinating approach.

GUPTA: But the NFL's chief medical officer, Dr. Allen Sills, says the league is not yet ready to give up on the kickoff altogether.

SILLS: All options are on the table. I mean, I think that certainly eliminating the play is one of those options, but I believe there are potentially other solutions. And I think that's our challenge, is, can we understand what's driving injury and again preserve the elements of the game? Because people love the athleticism. They love the speed. They love the skill level that you see out there.

GUPTA: So this year in the NFL, you're going to see a very different sort of kickoff, what they're calling a dynamic kickoff. Now, again, previously, as soon as the ball was kicked, all 11 members of the kicking team would start sprinting down the field to try and tackle the receiving team. Lots of speed, lots of space.

This season, only the kicker is back here, while the opposing teams are lined up all the way over here, separated by just five yards. And none of those players can move until the ball has been caught by the receiving team or it hits the ground. It reduces the speed and the space of the play. It's what competition committee co-chairman Rich McKay says is one of the biggest rule changes in 30 years.

RICH MCKAY, NFL COMPETITION COMMITTEE, CO-CHAIRMAN: The problem is, is, we're trying to not just make this game better next year, we're trying to keep the game going for 10, 20, 30, 40. That's what our legacy is supposed to be. And so you have got to look at health and safety and make sure that the numbers, when they tell you something, you do something.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: All right. Thanks to our Dr. Sanjay Gupta. Now, Dr. Rolle is back with this.

So what do you think? Do you like the idea of this changing the kickoff return, no kickoff return or just a shortened one? Will it make a big difference? I mean, we're talking both from the high school level and the NFL, but let's zero in on the NFL.

ROLLE: Yes, I think it's a really good idea actually, and I think eliminating the kickoff or even the sort of modified version they have now, I think that works.

[15:35:08]

It's a very dangerous play. I remember running down on kickoffs in college and in the NFL. That was my role as a special team player in the NFL. And it is fast, it is violent, it is aggressive, it's a high velocity impacts that are happening. And so removing some of the more dangerous motions and dangerous elements of the game works. I think in conjunction, contemporaneously with rule changes, I think technology around the sport needs to improve as well.

The helmets that are worn, having sensors that sort of detect and give objective data to, you know, analysts on the sidelines saying this player has gone through a very severe hit and we're not just going to take his word for it to say, I'm good, coach, I'm OK, because all of us will say that.

WHITFIELD: Right.

ROLLE: All of us have this culture of macho and want to stay in the game, but we need objective data to remove the decision at that point from that player and put it onto the data to know that you need to be safe and we need to take you out of this game, just like we would for any injury that you might have in the other parts of our body.

WHITFIELD: So while you try to advocate for change, you also have to, you know, pacify those who call them purists who say, but it's going to take away from the game. How do you argue that it won't take away from the game by trying to protect the players?

ROLLE: My argument is, I think that macho, sort of alpha male culture that permeates football is something of past, it's antiquated. Now we're moving into a time where we know more about the brain. We know more about what traumatic brain injury does to you as a human, to you as an individual, to you as a functioning member of our community. And so since we have this data, this evidence, let's work through that and preserve the game as much as we can and enjoy and highlight some of the beautiful strategies of the game, blocking, tackling, fundamentals, good footwork. Those things are actually very fun to watch and if we celebrate that

part, then we can remove some of the oohs and aahs around big slobber knocker hits that seemed to in the past have gotten the attention of fans and we can appreciate these young players, these young athletes, and appreciate the fact that once they walk away from the game they're able to have another chapter, another career like I do in neurosurgery. Whether it is they want to go into medicine or not, they will have another chapter, another chance at life of being successful for sure.

WHITFIELD: Oh, I love hearing this as, you know, a mother of a D1 football player right now. So this is definitely what I think a lot of us want to hear.

All right. Dr. Myron Rolle, thank you so much. Appreciate it.

ROLLE: Thanks, Fred.

WHITFIELD: And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:42:18]

WHITFIELD: President Biden and Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer are reaffirming their unwavering support for Ukraine following their meeting yesterday. The two leaders discussed potentially easing restrictions on Ukraine's use of long-range missile supplied by Western allies. These weapons could be launched on targets inside Russia. Meanwhile, in Ukraine, the war continues to take its toll on the country's troops.

CNN's Christiane Amanpour gained exclusive access to a medical evaluation train used by the Ukrainian army to bring injured soldiers from the frontlines to hospitals around the country.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR (voice-over): On a hot late summer morning, departure time is fast approaching at this railway station in Ukraine. But this is no ordinary train. It's a hospital on wheels, evacuating dozens of wounded military personnel away from the eastern front as Russia's brutal offensive grinds on. Paramedics carefully loading patient after patient, many of them unconscious, onto repurpose carriages.

It's a highly organized special operation and it's never been seen before. CNN gained unprecedented and exclusive access to what so far has remained a closely guarded military secret.

Before the train moves off, I meet 35-year-old Oleksandr, wounded by a drone strike, which has caused him to go deaf in one ear. His call sign is positive but he doesn't feel it.

OLEKSANDR, UKRAINIAN SOLDIER: I'm very tired. But hard times, and we must (speaking in foreign language). (Through text translation): And we must keep fighting no matter how

hard it is.

AMANPOUR: Do you feel that you have enough people, enough weapons to defend?

OLEKSANDR: No.

AMANPOUR: You don't have enough?

OLEKSANDR: Not enough. No.

(Through text translation): There aren't enough people and there definitely aren't enough weapons.

AMANPOUR (voice-over): As the train rolls on, we make our way to the intensive care unit where several soldiers are on life support. Bed after bed of broken and battered bodies, lives shattered in an instant, 90 percent of the wounds being treated here are from shrapnel. And yet many of these patients know they'll be patched up just to be sent back to the front as soon as possible.

[15:45:02]

This train and its cargo sum up Ukraine's state of military affairs, mostly ordinary citizens who've answered the call. Outmanned, outgunned by Russia, and yet still putting up a hell of a fight. Nurse Yulia makes this journey twice a week.

How do you feel being in here with these very badly wounded soldiers? How does it make you feel?

(Voice-over): I'm an empathetic person so it's difficult, she tells me. But you have to switch off your feelings at the moment of work, and later you can reflect.

And the story of frontline morale is on display here, too. If electrician Oleksandr was feeling down after 18 months fighting this brutal war, Stanislav, who signed up in March, is still full of patriotic fervor. He can still summon a smile even though he has shrapnel in his body and damage to his lungs.

STANISLAV, UKRAINIAN SOLDIER (through translator): Personally I was ready for it. I was ready to trade the shower stall, the good sheets and the bed, the good conditions that I had at home for a foxhole. I knew where I was going and what I was doing.

OLEKSANDR, UKRAINIAN ARMED FORCES MEDIC (through translator): The most difficult part is evacuation from the frontlines. Combat medics who work on the front are dying. Just like soldiers.

AMANPOUR: As these carriages rumble on through fields of gold, think for a moment of history repeating itself in Europe when thousands of ambulance trains evacuated casualties from World War I's trenches, more than a million to the U.K. alone. Tonight, darkness descends as we arrive at the destination and

suddenly there's activity everywhere again. As ambulances line up, collecting and dispatching to hospitals across the country, on the platform, the railway chief describes his pride and his sorrow.

OLEKSANDR PERTSOVSKYI, CEO, PASSENGER OPERATIONS AT UKRAINIAN RAILWAYS: I see those kids who are saying goodbye to their dads who are heading towards the frontlines. Seeing those same guys coming back effectively unconscious or with amputations, it feels like the price of the war is incredible.

AMANPOUR: Like a conveyor belt, industrial scale conversion of healthy young men and women into this. And yet as one of them told us, Ukraine is strong and motivated. While Russia has quantity, we have quality and we will win.

Christiane Amanpour, CNN, Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Back in this country, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson sat down for an in-depth interview with CNN. The deeply personal parenting challenge that might have caused her to abandon her legal career all together.

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[15:52:45]

WHITFIELD: In a new memoir, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson reveals that her older daughter is on the autism spectrum. The diagnosis took years to reach even as Brown Jackson and her husband juggled parenthood and demanding jobs.

She sat down with CNN's Abby Phillip for a very candid interview and talked about nearly quitting her job.

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ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR: So much of this book is deeply personal and you share about your family, your husband, and your two daughters. You also revealed for the first time that your older daughter, Talia, is autistic?

JUSTICE KETANJI BROWN JACKSON, U.S. SUPREME COURT: Yes.

PHILLIP: I should note that she consented to this being written about in the book, but this really struck me. You wrote, "Had I truly been the mindset to accept what was going on with my child, I probably would have quit my job to attend to her needs full time."

BROWN JACKSON: Yes.

PHILLIP: Did you really consider walking away from all that you had dreamed up for yourself and all that that you had accomplished? BROWN JACKSON: Absolutely. I mean, we struggled when she was young,

trying to really understand what she needed, what she needed to be for support in education and in other areas, but we didn't have a diagnosis. We didn't know that she was autistic until about seventh grade. And so I kept thinking, well, if I can just find the right school or if I can put her in the right lessons or after-school program or find the right nanny, everything will be fine.

And so it was that delusion in a way that kept me thinking I should just continue to stay in my job while I look for yet another accommodation. I think if I had known earlier, I probably would have just decided that I needed to care for her full time.

PHILLIP: Are you glad that you didn't make that choice, considering everything that's followed?

BROWN JACKSON: With everything that's happened, you know, it's hard to look back and feel regret. I mean, I'm honestly very honored to do what I'm doing. And she's at a good place now.

[15:55:02]

We've figured it out and so I think in general I ended up making the right choice.

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WHITFIELD: That's fascinating. Abby Phillip, our thanks for bringing that interview to us. We'll be right back.

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WHITFIELD: All right. Tonight, the comedy quiz series "HAVE I GOT NEWS FOR YOU" is coming to CNN. It's hosted by Roy Wood Jr. with team captains Amber Ruffin and Michael Ian Black, and three are bringing the jokes.