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Russia, Ukraine Agree to Local Ceasefire in Oleshky; Deadly Shooting in Jordan; Trump DOJ Sues to Block Results If Alaska GOP Senator Loses; Obama Returning as Campaign "Closer-in-Chief" for Democrats. Aired 3-3:30a ET

Aired October 24, 2026 - 03:00   ET

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

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BRIAN ABEL, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us around the world, I'm Brian Abel in Atlanta. Here's what's ahead.

A ceasefire in a Russian-occupied Ukrainian city made possible by the U.S. first lady and the pope, giving hope to those trapped in the city.

Two separate deadly shootings in the Middle East, one at an Israeli military checkpoint in the occupied West Bank. The other at a church in Jordan, setting the region on edge.

And authorities are bracing for another weekend of mass protests across Europe, set to kick off in about an hour. We'll see how Paris is preparing.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Live from Atlanta, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Brian Abel.

ABEL: We begin with a controversy over the Starshield satellite service in Ukraine, which is critical to its military operations. Ukraine says the service is still not fully operational, despite claims by U.S. president Donald Trump that it's been restored. It remains unclear who ordered the slowdown in the first place.

A person familiar with the matter told CNN that Trump recently called Elon Musk to restore the service but Musk says the U.S. military controls Starshield, a military version of his Starlink satellite system. Here's what Trump said when asked about the issue Friday

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Mr. President, you must know now who ordered the Starlink access in Ukraine to be restricted. Who was it?

Was it the Pentagon? DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: Well, I wouldn't tell you if I did know. I have no idea. But I wouldn't tell you if I did. Why would I tell you?

QUESTION: Zelenskyy said they still are --

TRUMP: If there is a problem, I'll get it straight.

QUESTION: Have you told Elon Musk to stop messing around with Ukraine's Starlink connection?

TRUMP: I have not spoken to him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: Meanwhile, there's new hope for residents of a Russian-occupied town in southern Ukraine. About 2,000 people, most of them elderly, remain trapped in Oleshky, where food, water and medicine are in short supply.

And now Russia and Ukraine say they've agreed to a local ceasefire there that would allow aid deliveries and civilian evacuations.

Pope Leo played a major role in that agreement. And as CNN's Julia Benbrook reports, so did U.S. first lady Melania Trump.

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JULIA BENBROOK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: First lady Melania Trump announced that she had helped secure a ceasefire agreement between Russia and Ukraine, set to go into effect in a matter of days.

Now a member of her team says that she first became really plugged in to this specific city during private conversations that took place at her "Fostering the Future Together" event in New York City during the United Nations General Assembly.

In a press release, the first lady's office said that she worked with both Russian and Ukrainian officials as an exclusive intermediary and really helped kick off discussions for this.

Now, in a statement, the first lady herself provided some more information.

She said, quote, "The situation in Oleshky is dire. Oleshky is a front line war city on the brink of disaster. All remaining population is comprised (sic) primarily of elderly residents who urgently need medical attention, medicine, food and clean water."

She went on to say, "The people of Oleshky have limited electricity, live amid mined roads and endure regular military attacks. It was abundantly clear that, without my intervention, the possibility to bring humanitarian aid into the city and to evacuate the elderly would be impossible."

Now the U.S. president, Donald Trump, he commented on this as he left Washington to travel out here to Florida on Friday and he praised his wife's efforts.

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TRUMP: What she wants to do is save children and that's her focus. And both sides are cooperating with her. So doing a very good job.

QUESTION: How did that all come about, Mr. President?

TRUMP: Her initiative and they contacted both sides and both sides wanted to do it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BENBROOK: When asked if the first lady would be a part of broader talks, potentially trilateral talks involving Russia and Ukraine, the president said no. But he went on to say that it's not the worst idea he's ever heard -- traveling with the president in Florida, Julia Benbrook, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ABEL: And joining us now is former CNN Moscow bureau chief Jill Dougherty, now an affiliated scholar with Georgetown University's Center for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies.

[03:05:09]

And Jill, I first want to get your read on the intervention here of both Melania Trump and Pope Leo in Oleshky. It appears their thumb on the scale will result in this upcoming ceasefire but also the ability for those civilians there to leave.

What do you make of all this?

JILL DOUGHERTY, GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY: Oh, I actually think it's very good news, there's no question. Melania Trump herself called it a dire situation. The pope was intervening. This is a very serious situation.

These people are under Russian occupation. A lot of them are old, sickly and the conditions are horrible. A lot -- there's really almost no food, no clean water, no medical care. And they had to get out but they couldn't get out because of the bombing.

So with this, you know, ceasefire, that apparently will take place on both sides, they should be able to get out. And it's very, very important on a humanitarian basis.

ABEL: Talk about Starlink now and the military version of it. And it feels almost as if the U.S. is playing a version of that Spider-man meme where, like, everyone is pointed at each other here as who did or who did not order the service to be throttled.

What's happening here?

Is the Trump administration misdirecting or minimizing or do they truly not know who ordered it? DOUGHERTY: Well, there has been reporting about who ordered it. You know, Elon Musk, perhaps. But I don't think anybody publicly really can, you know, put their finger on it at this point.

But there's no question if you stand back as you are, Brian, and look at this, it is -- it looks like it is deliberately confused in order to, I don't know, you know, share the blame. But it's very difficult for the Ukrainians because they have no predictability about what they're going to get.

And when Starlink is shut, is throttled, let's put it that way, it has really serious implications not only for protecting them against drones -- and especially drones that are coming into Kyiv and other cities -- but it also affects them on the front line.

So this is very serious. And I think the strange thing that I would point to is this has been going on for days. I mean, if you -- if there were an answer, which there really should be, it should be out there. There's been enough time and that would lead one, I think, to say that there's something else going on here.

ABEL: Also, if there was a switch turned off, enough time to turn the switch fully back on, right, you would think.

Jill, some of this recent degradation of the U.S.-Ukraine relationship in the recent days was due to president Trump waiving those sanctions on Russia and striking a deal on diesel. The president claims it will help Americans pockets with gas prices as Americans are heading to the polls for the midterms.

What's the level of accuracy of that strategy?

DOUGHERTY: A little bit of help. But actually, even the Russians say it won't help very much. If you look at some of the numbers, it could last for anywhere from, you know, a few days to perhaps a week. But that is not really going to have a material effect on American consumers.

And also it's going to begin -- that first delivery won't come until after the midterms. And that is the thing that the White House is focused on. They want to show that they are supposedly helping American consumers.

And, you know, before the elections take place is a very difficult thing for them politically, that people are quite angry about prices. So again, very little direct or major effect at all but it's almost symbolic in the way the president can say, I'm out there helping American consumers.

ABEL: And Jill, for those that follow communications coming out of the Kremlin, there also seems to be a shift in PR coming from there when it comes to the end of the war or at least the way that they talk about it. Help us understand that.

DOUGHERTY: Yes, I think there are two things. I watch the Russian media and then I also read analysis by Russians what's going on. And the media, of course, are controlled by the government. But you can glean some things. And what they're doing right now is saying we're getting to -- and the phrase was "final phase of resolution" of the -- of the war.

Now what does that mean?

I don't think -- and they're not saying -- it means the war will be over tomorrow but they do seem to be indicating that they feel -- and this is probably Vladimir Putin -- feels that we are getting to the end eventually here.

[03:10:08]

It's a shift in tone. And the other thing, Brian, that I would note, that I think really is important, is the Russians are really crowing about the fact that they have been able to separate those two issues, at least in their minds.

They have the issue of the Ukraine war and the issue of the relationship between the United States and Russia. That has been their purpose all along.

They wanted to say, you know, in spite of what's happening in Ukraine, we can still do deals. We can still have a relationship. And now there's no doubt they feel that they are able to do that. The diesel deal would be an indication, they would say, proof that they've been able to do that.

And that is something that Vladimir Putin wants. And he feels now that he's kind of in, I'd say, diplomatically, the driver's seat. But militarily, we're back to the, you know, the problem of having Starlink, et cetera. It's a difficult time, we have to admit, for the Ukrainians.

ABEL: All right. Jill Dougherty, always appreciate your insight and expertise. Thank you for joining us.

DOUGHERTY: Thank you, Brian.

Sources say the U.S. is rushing to move diplomats and their families from multiple Middle East nations as fears of regional escalation grow.

An unclassified memo to secretary of state Marco Rubio on Friday says U.S. intelligence has found that Iran has substantially increased efforts to target U.S. personnel and that plotting efforts have reached advanced stages in both the Middle East and certain other countries.

It comes, as Donald Trump has suggested he could relaunch strikes on Iran after the midterms.

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TRUMP: We obliterated Iran's nuclear enrichment capacity with Operation Midnight Hammer. You remember that late at night, 1:00 in the morning, and then did the rest with Operation Epic Fury, which it was. We may do another little epic fury or they'll agree.

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ABEL: In the occupied West Bank, the Israeli military is demolishing buildings in the city of Hebron. That's after two Palestinian gunmen opened fire on a military checkpoint on Friday. It comes just days before Israel holds crucial elections. Oren Liebermann has more.

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OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN JERUSALEM BUREAU CHIEF: Israel is moving very fast here and a harsh response here to a shooting attack that killed two Israeli soldiers early Friday morning and that seems to be the point here.

Four days before Israel elections, it appears as if prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his hardline right-wing government are trying to move fast and trying to have a harsh, large-scale response.

Early Friday morning, two Palestinian gunmen opened fire on an Israeli military checkpoint, killing two Israeli soldiers and wounding three others. What's shocking about the attack is long it lasted. We have seen attacks and incidents in the West Bank that last a very short period of time, a moment or a couple of minutes.

This, according to first responders and the security forces that came to the scene, lasted upwards of 20 minutes in repeated exchanges of gunfire between the gunmen and Israeli security forces.

The two gunmen were killed by security forces that responded to the scene. That was on Friday morning.

And within just a matter of hours here, Netanyahu, as well as the far right finance minister, vowed a harsh response. They said they would shut down the city of Hebron. That's a major Palestinian city with Israeli settlements in the heart of it and that they would consider doing that for more cities.

Initially, Netanyahu had said he would shut down the entire West Bank but it seems that he backed off that plan and kept it more localized but still to a major city.

They then said they would evacuate the neighborhood from which the gunmen came and search it house by house, looking for anything that they deemed to be terrorist infrastructure and then they would carry out demolitions. We are already seeing that take place.

In the past, we've seen Israel respond to an attack by destroying an attacker's home and searching the family's home. This -- the scale of the response, the speed and how big it is and how quickly it is, that's what's worth noting here. And it certainly seems related to the election that's in just a matter of days here.

Netanyahu has for years styled himself as Israel's Mr. Security. He's refused to take any responsibility for the myriad failures that- led up to October 7th three years ago and this appears to be him trying to reinstate himself as Mr. Security by carrying out a harsh, wide-scale response to a shooting attack in the West Bank this morning.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ABEL: Oren Liebermann reporting there.

To Jordan, where at least seven people were killed in an unprecedented shooting at a church, gunmen opening fire during a funeral service attended by Christians in the southern Karak province. You are looking at security camera footage showing gunmen near the church. Jordan's king is calling the attack a terrorist act.

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And he says those responsible will be dealt with harshly. It's not clear who the gunmen are or what motive they may have had. A manhunt is now underway.

And authorities in France are launching a massive security operation ahead of large protests planned for the coming hours. Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to participate in the main demonstration in Paris later today. CNN's Melissa Bell reports from the French capital.

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MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Businesses in Paris are boarding up and closing down ahead of another round of planned protests. Shopkeepers are hoping to avoid a repeat of last weekends massive demonstrations, when rioters ransacked thousands of stores and businesses across the country.

IVAN WEISS, BUSINESS OWNER (through translator): Well, let's just say that we were so frightened last weekend that we decided to get organized this week.

So we've installed mechanical rolling shutters on both of our store windows.

BELL (voice-over): French officials say that extra security will be deployed this weekend, including some 70,000 law enforcement officers backed by helicopters, armored vehicles and water cannons.

The protest in Paris has been authorized but President Macron banned all non-trade union protests on Saturday and some cities have imposed curfews. The interior minister has warned there will be zero tolerance for rioting.

LAURENT NUNEZ, FRENCH INTERIOR MINISTER (through translator): We are ready to be extremely responsive, extremely firm and we won't tolerate absolutely anything, nothing at all. BELL (voice-over): Some shop workers say they were appalled by the looting but hope the economic message driving the protests won't get lost once again.

RAPHAEL SAAD, SHOP WORKER (through translator): Violence is frightening. That's for sure.

But when you really think about the stakes, the reasons, the why of it, I believe it's more meaningful to point out that a looted store is less significant than the reality of someone living in precarious conditions or a child attending school in miserable conditions.

BELL (voice-over): As a precaution, many of Paris' hotspots like the Louvre de Musee d'Orsay and the Grand Palais will be closed this Saturday.

And adding to the security challenges facing French authorities, thousands of demonstrators are expected in the city of Orleans to protest against Marine Le Pen's far-right party, which is holding its political congress.

Parts of France once again on edge but this time, French authorities say they're ready to shut down any renewed unrest -- Melissa Bell, CNN, Paris.

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ABEL: Much more to come here on CNN NEWSROOM. We'll take a look at how former president Barack Obama is pitching in to help Democrats gain some seats in Congress this November.

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ABEL: Maine senator Susan Collins is in a tough campaign to get reelected and now it seems the White House is trying to show some flexibility on tariffs to help her win in November.

Collins said Friday that the Trump administration would exempt some key products from tariffs imposed on Canada. The trade war with Maine's northern neighbor has been a liability with Republicans in the state who oppose the tariffs.

In a CNN poll last month, 70 percent of voters in Maine view the trade policy negatively and Collins is fighting for a sixth term in the Senate against Democrat Troy Jackson. She has boasted about her efforts to win tariff exemptions from the Trump administration.

When she celebrated an exemption on road salt, Jackson replied in part, quote, "We can't eat road salt." The U.S. Department of Justice has preemptively filed a lawsuit to

block certification of Alaska's Senate election if the Republican incumbent loses in the upcoming midterm elections.

Senator Daniel S. Sullivan is in a tight race with Democrat Mary Peltola. The DOJ's lawsuit argues that another candidate named Daniel J. Sullivan could divert votes from the incumbent. Alaska uses ranked choice voting, so four candidates will appear on the general election ballot. The president talked about this lawsuit in Florida Friday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Any thoughts on the Alaska lawsuit?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Well, I am the one that said do it. They have two guys running named Dan Sullivan running. So the Democrats put up a guy, never -- I don't think he ever voted before, all of a sudden he decides to run for the Senate and his name is Dan Sullivan.

One is Daniel S. one is Daniel J. The Daniel J. is the fake.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: Former U.S. president Barack Obama is hitting the campaign trail in the final days of the midterm elections in an attempt to drum up excitement for Democratic candidates. And CNN's Arlette Saenz has the latest.

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ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the campaign's final stretch, Democrats are turning to the most popular figure from their party's recent past to secure a Senate majority for the future.

BARACK OBAMA (D), 44TH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm fired up. I'm ready to go.

SAENZ (voice-over): Former President Barack Obama is reprising his role as a closer on the campaign trail for an election he's described as, quote, "on the razor's edge." Up first on Saturday --

OBAMA: Hello, Ohio.

SAENZ (voice-over): -- Cleveland, Ohio, where Obama will campaign with Senate candidate Sherrod Brown and Amy Acton, the Democratic candidate for governor who was thrust in the spotlight after her GOP opponent, Vivek Ramaswamy, released a controversial ad featuring her estranged mother.

OBAMA: Amy understands that leaders should solve problems, not create them.

SAENZ (voice-over): That same day, Obama heads north to Michigan.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President Barack Obama. SAENZ (voice-over): Where he last campaigned for Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024.

OBAMA: But I was feeling some kind of way following Eminem. I'm nervous. But on the surface, I look calm and ready to drop bombs. But I keep on forgetting.

SAENZ (voice-over): This time, he'll appear with Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, hoping to boost support among Black voters in Detroit, who could be crucial to deciding the election.

OBAMA: That's why I'm asking you to support Abdul El-Sayed.

SAENZ (voice-over): Obama rounds out his campaign swing in Georgia on Wednesday with Senator Jon Ossoff and Keisha Lance Bottoms, the Democratic candidate for governor.

[03:25:04]

OBAMA: I hope you'll support my friend, Keisha Lance Bottoms.

SAENZ (voice-over): The former President is promoting Democrats across the midterms map.

OBAMA: Troy Jackson, Deb Haaland, send Roy Cooper to the Senate.

SAENZ (voice-over): Including with a stop in Texas, where Democrats have high hopes about turning a Senate seat and governor's office blue.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President --

OBAMA: Good to see you, brother.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nice to meet you, sir.

OBAMA: Good to see you.

SAENZ (voice-over): 18 years after a win in Iowa started his journey to the White House --

OBAMA: I got it. You ready for me, Josh?

JOSH TUREK (D-IA), U.S. SENATORIAL CANDIDATE: I'm ready.

SAENZ (voice-over): -- Obama offering a boost to Democratic Senate candidate Josh Turek.

OBAMA: Let's go. We playing horse or what?

TUREK: We're playing Iowa.

OBAMA: I know a little something about winning Iowa.

SAENZ (voice-over): And before the 2026 midterms even end, Obama is already turning his attention to 2028, urging candidates to prioritize plans to address artificial intelligence in their campaigns.

OBAMA: If somebody does not have a serious plan for how to deal with this, then they're not meeting the moment. And you should probably look for somebody else.

SAENZ: And this weekend, we'll have dueling presidential campaign appearances as president Trump will rally voters in Georgia on Saturday before traveling to Michigan on Sunday to campaign with Republicans there, one day after former President Obama is in the state.

And it comes as Americans view President Obama more favorably than any other living president. A CNN poll conducted back in May showed that 57 percent of respondents had a favorable opinion of Obama, which was higher than president Trump and all the other living presidents as well.

Now Obama is a main motivator for the Democratic base. The question is whether these appearances will be enough to get his Democratic candidates across the finish line -- Arlette Saenz, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ABEL: Thank you for watching. I'm Brian Abel in Atlanta. "SEASONS" is next.