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E.U. Announces $105 Billion Funding Plan for Ukraine; Putin Fields Questions During Annual News Conference; Suspect in Brown University, MIT Shootings Found Dead; DOJ to Release Several Hundred Thousand Epstein Documents Today; Winter Storms Add to Danger of Living in Damaged Buildings in Gaza; Man Found Guilty of Drugging, Raping Unconscious Wife; Trump to Take His Economic Message to North Carolina. Aired 10-11a ET
Aired December 19, 2025 - 10:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[10:00:17]
ELENI GIOKOS, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Welcome to the second hour of the show. I'm Eleni Giokos in Dubai, where the time is just after 7:00 in the
evening.
Russian President Vladimir Putin says we are ready and willing to end this conflict with Ukraine peacefully at the annual yearend press conference.
Plus U.S. police say the manhunt for the Brown University mass shooter is over. But questions surrounding his alleged murder spree across New England
still remain. And we will soon find out how much of the Epstein files the U.S. Justice Department has redacted. Today is the deadline to release the
files.
"We have a deal." After talks late into the night the E.U. has agreed to a massive new plan to provide funding to Ukraine over the next two years. The
deal, worth $105 billion, will be achieved through borrowing, not the use of billions of dollars of frozen Russian assets. Ukraine's president says
he's grateful for the support, which was outlined by the German chancellor in Brussels.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FRIEDRICH MERZ, GERMAN CHANCELLOR (through translator): The financial package for Ukraine is in place. As I requested, it includes an interest-
free loan of 90 billion euros. Ukraine will only have to repay this loan if it receives compensation from Russia. As you know, we Europeans already
decided last Friday to freeze Russian assets and to keep them frozen until Russia has paid compensation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GIOKOS: Clare Sebastian was in Brussels while the marathon talks were taking place, and she explains where the money will come from.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: European leaders had promised that they would not leave this summit until they had a clear plan as to how to fund
Ukraine through the next two years. And they kept that promise in the early hours of Friday morning after a marathon day of talks, they came to a deal.
But it wasn't what some had hoped or even expected. The big focus coming into this was whether or not they would be able to use the cash balances
from Russia's frozen assets here in Europe to fund a loan for Ukraine.
They haven't managed to reach a deal on that. Instead, they're going to borrow on the capital markets, and that will be guaranteed by unspent funds
in the E.U. budget. Either way, Ukraine will not have to pay this back until the war ends and Russia pays reparations. European leaders here were
keen to paint this as a win.
ANTONIO COSTA, EUROPEAN COUNCIL PRESIDENT: The message we are sending to Russia today is crystal clear. First, you have not achieved your objectives
in Ukraine. Second, Europe stands with Ukraine today, tomorrow and as long as necessary.
BART DE WEVER, BELGIAN PRIME MINISTER: Had we left Brussels divided today, Europe would have walked away from geopolitical relevance. It would have
been a total disaster.
SEBASTIAN: So Europe has passed this test of its strength and unity. But this whole process did amplify divisions within the bloc. And it suddenly
came down to the wire for Ukraine, which by the spring would be facing a cash crunch so large that its president, who was here today, President
Zelenskyy, warned that it might even have to cut back on its critical drone production.
That crisis, for now, seems to be averted, and Ukraine goes into the next phase of peace talks with the U.S. in a stronger position.
Clare Sebastian, CNN, in Brussels.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GIOKOS: Europe's financial package for Ukraine comes as Russia's president warns of severe consequences, if any frozen Russian assets are ever used
for Ukraine's defense. Vladimir Putin's comments coming during his annual press conference in Moscow, where he fields dozens of questions from
Russian citizens as well as journalists.
Last hour I spoke to Fred Pleitgen in Moscow about today's press conference and Putin's reaction to the events in Brussels.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it certainly is a win for him. And one of the interesting things, of course,
that we've also seen today is that his envoy, who's been speaking to the Americans, Kirill Dmitriev, he also claimed that this was a win for Russia
and a win for international law as Dmitriev put it. Nevertheless, Vladimir Putin, at this press conference which happened in the room right behind me
and wrapped I would say about 20 minutes ago, still ripped into European nations for even entertaining that idea, calling all of this not stealing
but robbery because he says it's something that would happen in broad daylight.
So clearly the Russians are still not happy with the conduct of the Europeans and also threatening, as you put it, severe consequences if
Russian funds are used to help Ukraine.
Let's listen in.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VLADIMIR PUTIN, RUSSIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): A theft is a secret stealing of property. But here they're trying to do it openly. It's a
robbery. But why are they failing? Because the consequences for them will be severe.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[10:05:07]
PLEITGEN: So he's saying that the consequences would be severe for the Europeans as well. Of course, there are still a lot of funds and a lot of
assets of European countries and European companies that are here in Russia as well. So that could be one of the reasons why Vladimir Putin was
speaking about that. At the same time, you're absolutely right to point out that the Russian leader did say that Russia was willing to engage in
diplomacy, wanted to find a peaceful solution to the conflict in Ukraine.
But at the same time, he was also still very bullish about Russia's military capabilities, saying that Russia could continue all this for an
extended period of time. The people are still signing up for what Russia still calls its special military operation. So on the one hand, the
Russians saying that they are willing to talk, but it certainly seems as though what they want is a compromise on Moscow's terms -- Eleni.
GIOKOS: Yes, exactly. I was just about to say that. They want -- they say they want diplomacy, but they want the war to end on their terms. And that
means major territorial losses for Ukraine. And, you know, the Europeans feel out of the conversation. Macron earlier said he wants to engage in
diplomacy with Vladimir Putin.
Do you think things could be changing on the diplomacy front?
PLEITGEN: Well, I think to a certain extent they have been changing really over the course of this week. If we go back and look at talks that happened
in Berlin this past Monday between the U.S. delegation and the Ukrainians, of course, also involving the Europeans as well, I think the Europeans,
including the French, of course, saw that as a sort of reentry into the diplomatic process after they've sort of been shut out by the Europeans,
certainly feeling that the U.S. side is closer in its estimates of what's going on to the Russian side than possibly to the European side.
But I think that they feel that they've closed that gap. So right now, the Europeans certainly believe that they're back part of the fold as far as
the diplomatic process is concerned. At the same time, of course, the Russians are very entrenched in their positions. They feel that they have
the momentum on the battlefield. They say their forces are moving forward. They say that it's the Ukrainians who need to pause on the battlefield and
not the Russians.
And so therefore, the Russians obviously have some very steep demands as far as the territories are concerned. The big question is whether or not
one of those big compromises that was reached earlier this week, with the U.S. saying that it would grant Ukraine security guarantees similar to
those of being a member of NATO, whether or not that does anything to accelerate the talks or whether or not that's something that will also sort
of fizzle as well -- Eleni.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GIOKOS: All right. Fred Pleitgen for us in Moscow.
Now, the suspect in last weekend's mass shooting at Brown University has been found dead. Police say they tracked Claudio Neves Valente, a 48-year-
old Portuguese national, to a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire, where he had taken his own life. Neves Valente had been a student at Brown.
Prosecutors say he was also responsible for the killing of an MIT professor days after the shooting at Brown.
We've got Michael Yoshida in Salem for us in New Hampshire to tell us a little bit more about the suspect. And frankly, six days in, it was a
Reddit post that authorities used to find him. Tell us more.
MICHAEL YOSHIDA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey there, Eleni. You mentioned that social media post that was key to investigators saying that originally it
was posted on Reddit. They were able to actually track that person down. They came forward to investigators and provided the key information that
really broke this case wide open over the last 48 hours, identifying a vehicle as well as a license plate connected to a person of interest that
police then tracked across the border into Massachusetts, into Boston, to a rental car company.
And it was there that they figured out the person who had rented that car was their suspect in both this Brown University shooting, as well as this
shooting and killing of an MIT professor. From there, investigators were led to the storage unit here in Salem, New Hampshire. This is about 30
minutes or so north of Boston, Massachusetts, just across the border into the neighboring state.
Once inside the storage facility, that's where they found this suspect, 48- year-old Claudio Neves Valente, dead, as appearances of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. So this manhunt over. But the search for a motive, that
continues as this investigation still active and ongoing.
GIOKOS: Yes. So tell me a little bit about how they were able to link him to the shooting of an MIT professor, which happened after the shooting at
Brown University.
YOSHIDA: For sure. That shooting at Brown happened this past Saturday, two days later and about 50 miles north in a suburb of Boston is when that MIT
professor was shot and later died at a hospital. Investigators revealing to us last night that they actually, as they were piecing all of this
together, found surveillance video showing the suspect within a half mile of that MIT professor's home in a suburb of Boston.
[10:10:02]
They then later also found video showing that suspect in the moments after that murder, and then eventually a few hours later back here at this
storage facility. So that's one of the key pieces that they're using to show the link there.
Also an interesting detail they gave to us is that this MIT professor and this suspect, who I believe he had mentioned was a Portuguese national,
they originally were at the same school, the same academic area in Portugal back in the late '90s. So that's one connection obviously they're diving
into as they try and answer why these two shootings happened, one at Brown University, the other the murder of that MIT professor.
GIOKOS: So, Michael, what's -- I mean, were they trying to figure out the motive? And clearly the suspect is dead. How are they going to be able to
piece together the motive overall? Obviously, the very interesting information that he was a former student at Brown, he had also gone to
school in Portugal with the MIT professor.
YOSHIDA: Yes. Those are two pieces that obviously were focusing in on right now, but they're also starting to go through kind of the backstory,
figuring out how long was this suspect here in the New England area. We did get some of that information. They know they believe he had been living
here throughout 2025. And at some point in November had actually rented this storage unit, then gone to Boston, rented that vehicle.
So as they're starting to make that timeline of his events, hopefully some of that will provide some insight into the potential motivations for both
of these shootings.
GIOKOS: Michael Yoshida, thank you so much for that.
All right. I want to stay on the story. Jason Pack is a first responder and former FBI special agent.
Jason, welcome to the show. I want to start with this social media post, frankly, a post on Reddit, that led the authorities finding the suspect.
What is your takeaway on this investigation? How did evolved and importantly the fact that it took six days?
JASON PACK, FORMER FBI SUPERVISORY SPECIAL AGENT: Well, these investigations do take time to be thorough, and a lot of times the police
will have leads that they don't necessarily speak to the public about. So that is not in and of itself out of the ordinary. What is remarkable is
that this person that wrote the tip or provided that tip on Reddit apparently was living in the same building. So in essence, it was kind of
his home and he knew who was supposed to be there and who wasn't.
And that really proved critical for investigators as he stepped up, met with the police, and then within hours, they had the credit card
information, which led to the -- from the rental car, which led to that New Hampshire location. So really within the span of eight to 10 hours after
identifying this key witness, the case really moved forward quickly.
GIOKOS: It did indeed. I mean, it's pretty extraordinary. What's also quite fascinating is the suspect has also been linked to the killing of an MIT
professor. And that happened two days after Brown University mass shooting. What are you reading into this and in terms of how authorities were able to
link these two events?
PACK: It seems personal, doesn't it? So I think the investigators now, while they figured out, as your reporters have been saying, the who, that
why becomes a really important question. We know there was some overlap in Portugal. The FBI has a legal attache office in Madrid that covers
Portugal. I imagine they're probably in touch with the Portuguese authorities to try to start an interview any kind of associates or
witnesses or people, acquaintances they may have had there.
Meanwhile, in Miami, the FBI Miami field office, and local authorities there supporting the investigation by tracing the steps of the suspect
while he was down there. And then in the past few months, what he's been doing up in the New England area, like tracing his steps. Has he cased the
university more than once? Will we find those videos in the MIT shooting?
GIOKOS: Yes, you also said something --
PACK: Will he be chasing that?
GIOKOS: Yes, yes. And you also said something really important. You said it seems personal. And I mean, everyone has been asking the question if the
suspect is dead, how do you piece together this motive? You've got -- it's almost linked to academic institutions. He was studying or doing at school
in Portugal with a former MIT professor, and then he was also a student at Brown University decades ago.
PACK: Yes. Along this pathway of violence that investigators use to try to determine motive, they're going to look at that like something happened in
some grievance he must have had, whether against an institution which may have been Brown University, and then more so against a person, which may
have been this professor or a combination of both.
What we see a lot of times in these cases is there's no one easy answer here. So putting the pieces together from his social media, from
interviews, from his acquaintances, will hopefully determine a motive and be able to determine exactly why he targeted the school and the professor
in his home.
[10:15:03]
GIOKOS: So I also want to talk about, you know, why this story that -- two stories we've been covering at the same time this week. In Australia, you
had the mass shooting at Bondi Beach and Australian government responding very quickly about tighter gun laws. You know, this hasn't come up in the
United States and we've seen a lot of issues around and questions around gun laws.
In the meantime, the U.S. government has chosen to revoke the green card lottery, which is how this Portuguese national was able to obtain the right
to live in the United States. Do you believe this is the correct approach?
PACK: Well, I don't know all the information. I do know it's important to know who's coming into your country. And so I think a review of that is not
unwarranted, although in this case, it appears that he did everything legally and was here in the country lawfully. But it is a good idea to know
who's in the country and doing that may be important. Same thing in the ACOS folks there in Australia.
The Australian Federal Police, all those folks have a really tough job because the intelligence, the Australian intelligence has to do an
intelligence investigation and in addition to a criminal investigation. And it's kind of like having to predict that movie, "The Minority Report,"
what's going to happen next. So you really have to work with the facts that you have at the time and take some of these clues, behavioral clues into
account.
But you have to violate a criminal offense before somebody can actually take you into custody. So that's really the tough part of law enforcement
these days with these active shootings.
GIOKOS: Yes. I mean, and to be honest, I mean, we've been talking about this story for the last six days, and I think there's been a lot of
criticism around why it took so long. We've been hearing from a lot of, you know, people, that have been investigating this and say they have to get
out of the noise because they have to focus on the investigation.
Do you believe that the criticism was warranted in terms of the time that it took, because, frankly, they were lacking in surveillance footage, which
would've been critical in finding the suspect?
PACK: Well, it seems like they had the surveillance footage. They just didn't have the context of that witness that was able to put that piece
together for them. These -- I worked the Boston marathon bombing, and it takes days to do these types of things. Even though you have to come out
and brief the public, you try to be as transparent as possible, but you still want to investigate every possible alternative that you have out
there.
You don't want to get fixated one way and go in the other. And I know they had that person of interest at first, but I think at the same time they
were doing other avenues of investigation. So while it may seem publicly that these things are going that way, in reality I think that they really
were doing the right things. As it turned out yesterday, when you get one tip, you match the help from the public with the investigative resources
that were there.
That's usually a really good combination. I will say there always lessons to be learned from each of these things. The FBI learned many lessons from
all these high profile cases and have been able to make adjustments. And I'm sure going forward people involved in this case, whether it's a
university or police or whomever, will have two takeaways to be able to make adjustments and hopefully make things safer.
GIOKOS: Yes. Yes. All right, Jason Pack, great to have you with us. Thank you so much for your time.
All right. And still to come, it's deadline day. The U.S. Justice Department must make public what it knows about the Jeffrey Epstein case. A
look at what's going on behind the scenes in the scramble of what to release and what to redact.
And in Gaza, families face a winter like no other, living in ruins with every storm threatening their homes and their lives. A look at those
conditions when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:20:34]
GIOKOS: New today, the U.S. deputy attorney general is giving us an idea of what will and will not be coming from the U.S. Justice Department as it
faces a deadline of today to release the Jeffrey Epstein files.
I want you to take a listen to what Todd Blanche said in an interview earlier.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TODD BLANCHE, U.S. DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: I expect that we're going to release several hundred thousand documents today, and those documents will
come in all different forms, photographs and other materials associated with all of the investigations into Mr. Epstein. And so I expect that we're
going to release more documents over the next couple of weeks. So today, several hundred thousand and then over the next couple of weeks, I expect
several hundred thousand more.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GIOKOS: I want to bring in Gene Rossi for more on this. He's a former federal prosecutor.
Gene, great to have you with us. You just heard from Todd Blanche and he says, well, they're not going to be ready. They're going to release several
hundred thousand today. And then over the next couple of weeks, several hundred thousand more. What do you make of this?
GENE ROSSI, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Well, I'm not -- I'm not surprised. There are a lot of documents, a lot of photos. So as long as the Department
of Justice is making a good faith effort to release these documents and photos, I'm fine with that. I don't -- I did not expect today everything is
going to be turned over. It's just a herculean task given the amount of evidence.
But what I do expect is this. Because there's an alleged ongoing investigation, they may hold back certain documents because in their mind,
the Department of Justice's mind, it could compromise an ongoing investigation. And we can debate whether that ongoing investigation is
political, if it's real, or if it's just made up. But even if they didn't have an ongoing investigation, you will probably see a lot of documents
that are redacted, and you're going to see persons, you know, they may just have person one or person two or victim one, victim two, because they're
trying to protect the integrity of the process and not to unfairly criticize or make allegations against people who did not commit any crimes
or victims that don't want their names shared. So you're going to see, in my view, whatever comes out today is going to have a lot of redactions.
GIOKOS: Yes. I want to talk about the redactions because frankly victims want to actually see the names of perpetrators revealed. You've got the
issue of protecting the victims, and there's a lot of questions about what kind of redactions should we be expecting?
ROSSI: Well, I'll just give you a good example. I have my holiday tie on. I'm going to a holiday party this afternoon. I'm interviewed by the FBI,
and I mentioned 30 people who attended the party. So let's just say it was Jeffrey Epstein's house or Mar-a-Lago. Just because a person is mentioned
as being at the party, you may want to redact their name because it insinuates that they were involved in this conspiracy regarding sex
trafficking with Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein.
So you got to be careful about throwing out people's names because you don't want to tarnish the reputation and attack the integrity of people who
are truly innocent and just happen to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. You got to be very careful on that. For example, if you indict
somebody, if I'm indicted for drug dealing or any kind of crime, and I'm the only defendant in that indictment, there will be conspirators mentioned
in the indictment who have not been charged, but they're called conspirator one, conspirator two.
They may do that. They may just insert, you know, perpetrator one, victim one, instead of putting their names because you got to be very careful.
GIOKOS: Yes. I just --
ROSSI: Regardless of who's running the Justice Department. Yes.
GIOKOS: I totally get that. I mean, and frankly, when you were talking about sort of guilty by association, perhaps you were talking about, you
know, the analogy you mentioned, but we've had so many photos that have been released by the House Oversight Committee, and frankly, 68 more
photographs.
[10:25:01]
The victims have voiced their frustration because some of these pictures, they say, have been put out of context. But these are high profile names
that have been now associated with Jeffrey Epstein. And frankly, it's gone to the public for trial.
ROSSI: Well, what I want to say about what's coming out today, and this will be the first tranche, according to Deputy Attorney General Blanche,
we're going to have more documents. And that I give the Department of Justice a pass on that because there's just so much. But if they redact
gratuitously, if they just do wholesale redactions where you have almost an entire page redacted, you're going to -- you're going to have holy H, E,
double hockey sticks, from the Congress, especially the House side if it changes hands and they'll take the Department of Justice to task if they
are gratuitously redacting names. And if they are gratuitously redacting names of people who should be mentioned that could cause political
repercussions that the White House does not want to deal with.
GIOKOS: Yes. So, Gene, you know, there are 300 gigabytes of information that are going to be released, and we know there's going to be redactions
and so forth. But how is this evidence going to be used? Because we're talking about accountability at some point in time. We're talking about
taking responsibility. We're talking about people having their day in court ultimately. How will this evidence be used?
ROSSI: Well, the first thing, Eleni, when you look at a crime, alleged crime, is what's the statute of limitations? I mean, these events occurred
many, many years ago. And you may have -- you may be barred by the statute of limitations to bring any charges. But if there are events that occurred
within the statute of limitations, whether it's five, 10 or 15 years or more, then somebody better get a lawyer because they could be in harm's
way.
That's point number one. Point number two, there's the political ramifications. Even if there is a bar on the statute of limitations and
you're prohibited from charging somebody, you have political ramifications. Why did this individual or persons in high, high places, why did they get a
pass on being investigated and charged? That's a very important issue that will be in the political arena if you can't investigate or charge somebody
because of the statute of limitations prohibition.
GIOKOS: All right. Well, Gene, good to have you on. And I see your Christmas tie. Enjoy your Christmas party later today. And thank you for
that analysis. We'll speak soon.
ROSSI: Happy holidays. Happy holidays.
GIOKOS: Take care. Happy holidays to you as well.
All right. I want to take you now to a story that we're going to be covering right after this short break. A horrifying case of sexual abuse in
Germany that's drawing chilling parallels with a case in France that was in the news one year ago. We have that story just ahead. Stick with CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:30:29]
GIOKOS: Welcome back to CONNECT THE WORLD with me, Eleni Giokos. Here are your headlines.
The European Union has reached a deal to provide desperately needed financing for Ukraine. Kyiv will receive more than $100 billion over the
next two years. The money won't come from Russian assets frozen in Europe. Russia's president says if Europe ever does use frozen Russian assets to
assist Ukraine, European countries would face severe consequences. Vladimir Putin gave the warning during his annual press conference in Moscow. He
also said Russia is willing to end the war based on principles he laid out in June, which include ceding territory to Russia.
Police say the suspect in the Brown University mass shooting was found dead in a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire, late on Thursday. They say
Claudio Neves Valencia, a 48-year-old Portuguese national, took his own life. Neves Valenti is also believed to be responsible for the killing of
an MIT professor days after the shooting at Brown.
President Trump's special envoy, Steve Witkoff, is set to hold high stakes talks in Miami today. Focused on both Ukraine and Gaza. Witkoff is expected
to meet with Russian officials, including Moscow's top economic envoy Kirill Dmitriev, to discuss the latest proposal to end the war in Ukraine.
Also, while in Miami, Witkoff will meet officials from Egypt, Turkey and Qatar to discuss the next phase of the Gaza peace plan.
The United Arab Emirates is sending 10 million meals to Palestinians in Gaza. The shipment is expected to in early January to help feed 2 million
people in the enclave. United nations officials say the needs are enormous and the ongoing funding crisis is forcing life or death decisions about
which humanitarian programs can continue.
Devastation and danger are now parts of daily life for Gaza's families. After two years of war, most buildings are barely standing and winter
storms are making survival even harder.
CNN's Paula Hancocks reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): These buildings defy gravity. Top floors collapsed, vast slabs of concrete are tenuously
balanced, potholed walls that do not look strong enough to hold the ruins together. Yet countless families across Gaza have no choice but to live
inside this wreckage. Buildings exposed to the elements, no protection against winter storms.
(INAUDIBLE) says her family cannot move back to their home in Shejaiya, as the Israeli military occupies the area. On the first day of the storm, she
says, "We could hear stones cracking above our heads. Sand was falling into our eyes. We covered our heads to protect us from the water."
While the cease fire appears to be holding, the United Nations says two years of Israeli strikes have left more than 80 percent of buildings
destroyed or damaged. Of those buildings still standing, almost none would be considered habitable elsewhere in the world. Awan al-Haj (PH) says every
building in this area of Khan Younis is the same. Gaza's Civil Defense recommends the displaced should leave damaged buildings during the rains,
but for most there is no other option.
He says the storm comes then sand, water, rubble comes down just like this. Every building has collapses. But what is the alternative? Is the
alternative to go and sit by the sea or in a tent in the freezing cold or in the water?
This woman agrees. Her granddaughter was born just days ago. She says their tent flooded and collapsed during the last storm. They now shelter in
wreckage she knows could become their tomb.
"If we do not die because of the Israeli," she says, "we will die when the house collapses on us. Because this roof, this entire living room roof is
going to fall."
And they do fall frequently. When this building in al-Shati camp collapsed Tuesday, it killed the owner and injured two others. One of the neighbors
says, "Houses keep collapsing. Someone do something about how we are living. Day after day a house falls. Day after day, people die."
[10:35:06]
The United Nations says it's blocked by Israel from directly bringing aid into Gaza. It says 1.3 million Palestinians need urgent shelter this
winter. Israel says close to 310,000 tents and tarpaulins have entered Gaza recently.
It is an impossible choice for Palestinians who survived the war. A limited number of tents that can flood or be swept away, or a ruined building that
could collapse at any time.
Paula Hancocks, CNN, Abu Dhabi.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GIOKOS: I want to take you now to a shocking case in Germany where a man has been found guilty of drugging and raping his unconscious wife over a
period of years. The abuse was filmed and posted on the internet. The verdict comes a year on from a similar case in France, which raised
questions about the extent of gender based violence and misogyny.
Saskya Vandoorne has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SASKYA VANDOORNE, CNN PARIS BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): It's been dubbed the German Pelicot after the French case of a husband who drugged his wife,
recruited dozens of men to rape her, and filmed the abuse. On Friday in Aachen, a German court found a 61-year-old school janitor, identified as
Fernando P., guilty of secretly drugging and raping his wife for years. He also filmed the abuse and shared it online. A judge sentenced him to eight
years in prison, though the ruling can be appealed.
The verdict comes exactly one year to the day after 46 men were found guilty of raping Gisele Pelicot. And I was in the courtroom that day in
Avignon, and I never thought that a year on, I'd be covering a case with such striking similarities.
(Voice-over): Having followed both trials, there's generally a very much shared playbook seen in such cases. Using the online world to share and
amplify this kind of abuse. But unlike Gisele Pelicot, the victim in the Aachen case has chosen to remain anonymous. Shortly after the trial began,
the public was excluded from the courtroom to protect the victim's privacy. According to local media reports, the defendant later confessed to most of
the acts during closed door hearings.
German campaigners say current consent laws don't protect women well enough from this kind of abuse, while this French lawmaker points towards a much
wider trend.
SANDRINE JOSSO, FRENCH LAWMAKER (through translator): During my government assignment, I traveled to quite a few countries and in fact, these
operating methods are everywhere, in every country. They're further activated by social networks where communities come together and share tips
and tricks.
VANDOORNE (voice-over): This whole issue is sure to come under the microscope once again when Gisele Pelicot publishes her memoir in two
months' time.
Saskya Vandoorne, CNN, Paris.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GIOKOS: All right, you're watching CONNECT THE WORLD. There's more news right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:40:02]
GIOKOS: U.S. president Donald Trump is heading to North Carolina today to promote his economic message. Earlier this week, the president touted what
he sees as his economic successes in a prime time speech from the White House that contained multiple inaccuracies. He heaped blame for America's
economic woes on his predecessor, and it will be no surprise if he does the same today.
He also plans to talk about border security and the deployment of the National Guard troops to various U.S. cities.
Alayna Treene joins us now.
Alayna, we got a very strong message when he had that speech at the White House. And importantly, it was loose on facts. So what are we expecting
today? Sort of a longer version of this and then more information.
ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. I mean, I would actually probably compare this more to the address. I mean, just knowing the
president and how he likes to speak at these different type of rallies, particularly when he has a crowd to play off of. This will likely be more
like the speech he gave last week when he traveled to Pennsylvania, to a swing district there, to give a speech that was really supposed to be
focused on this issue of affordability and the high cost of living that many Americans say that they are currently struggling under.
You know, that speech he actually wove and talked a lot about a number of different topics. He also similarly to that national address on Wednesday
night placed a lot of blame at the feet of his predecessor, Joe Biden. I think it will likely be like that, but we'll see. And look, I think broadly
the reason that the president is making these trips is because his administration and particularly his closest advisers, they recognize that
this is a major problem for them.
I'd remind you that when Trump was elected just a little more than a year ago, one of the issues that propelled him back into the White House was
this idea of the economy and his promise that he would usher in a new golden economic age for Americans who had been already dealing with high
inflation under the Biden administration. Well, he is now almost a year into his second term, and Americans are saying they are not feeling any
more confident.
And I've actually traveled the country. I was in Pennsylvania with him when he gave that speech last week. I talked to a lot of his supporters, and
some of them acknowledged the case that he's been trying to make, which is that he feels, the president, that he had inherited a mess of an economy
from Joe Biden. The problem is, they say that they are losing patience, that you can only argue for so much time and try to pass the blame so much
to what you were given when you entered office, and it's time for him to really try to continue to make policies better so that Americans can really
feel like they are in a better place financially.
And so the speech tonight is really supposed to be focused on that issue. It also comes, as we've reported, that the president is planning to make a
number of domestic trips like this focused exactly on this issue of the economy and the high cost of living into the new year. This is really going
to be a big push for them. He's going to be traveling. One of White House officials told me they want him to travel maybe once a week to give these
types of speeches, but it's all about really trying to better message this ahead of the midterm elections next year because if they cannot fix this by
then, it really could be an issue for Republicans, particularly those trying to keep their seats in Congress.
GIOKOS: All right. Alayna Treene, good to see you and thank you for that update.
TREENE: Thanks.
GIOKOS: It's for sure an uphill climb but Democrats in the U.S. state of Tennessee are energized after a recent special election cut a huge gap into
the margin President Trump won by in last year's presidential election. And as Democrats eyeing what would be an improbable victory in the 2026
midterms, John King traveled to Nashville, America's Music City, to assess the Democrats' mood.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Music City, Nashville, Tennessee. Yes, a place where stars are born, but also a place
where dreams can be crushed. Just ask a local Democrat.
MEGAN SCHWALM, TENNESSEE VOTER: While there are moments of hope, for me there are often overwhelming moments of hopelessness as well.
KING (voice-over): Yet there's more than coffee brewing here. New vibe at the Liberal Lady Social Group Megan Schwalm started three years ago. More
members and a more ambitious conversation.
SCHWALM: Caregiver tax credit, so that I'm really excited about.
KING (voice-over): Local school board fights brought most of these women here. Now, they're excited about 2026 midterm House races where Democrats
normally wouldn't have a prayer.
SCHWALM: When you're here, it's very clear you're in the Bible belt. Beliefs are very different from beliefs in Nashville and politically, it's
very different going from Nashville to here.
KING (voice-over): This is Mount Juliet, a Nashville suburb in the Fifth Congressional District. Early this month, there was a special election in
the neighboring Seventh District. Democrat Aftyn Behn lost by nine points. But a year earlier, the Republican won by 22.
SCHWALM: I mean, the numbers are the numbers. And you know, if we can keep closing that gap, that's incredible.
[10:45:02]
But gerrymandering makes it nearly impossible to win. At least closing the gap does provide a little more hope for what things might look like in the
next election. Right?
KING (voice-over): There's chatter maybe a moderate would've run even stronger, but no one here sees it that way.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We've been running moderates.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It doesn't work.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And that hasn't gotten us anywhere.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And she that build that momentum.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, we don't want liberal light anymore. We want the actual liberal.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think if they try and run someone more moderate and they lose that progressive vote that they would've gotten with her, they're
fooling themselves.
KING (voice-over): Everyone here lives within an hour of Nashville, but they are now sprinkled across three congressional districts.
The old Fifth Congressional district included all of Nashville and was reliably blue, represented by a Democrat from 1875 to 2023. That's 148
years. But Tennessee Republicans redrew the lines before the 2022 elections, carving Nashville into three congressional districts that
stretch from the city out to the suburbs, well out into rural Tennessee. And they are reliably red. President Trump, for example, in 2024, carried
the Fifth Congressional District by 18 points, the Sixth by 35. And here in the Seventh, where we are right now, by 22 points despite getting trounced
in Nashville.
(Voice-over): Cyndi Cortes and her husband own the coffee shop where the liberal ladies meet. They moved from Nashville to Mount Juliet two years
ago, and are Trump supporters.
LUIS CORTES, MOUNT JULIET RESIDENT: There's something that in these kind of suburbia Nashville that we really hold dear, and that's our love for God at
first and then our love for family, and then our love for country.
KING (voice-over): Luis Cortes cannot vote. His parents crossed illegally from Mexico when he was a child. They were deported when Luis was 17. He
was allowed to stay.
L. CORTES: I was part of the program that President Obama started with the DACA.
KING (voice-over): Luis has permanent resident status now and hopes to one day become a citizen.
Cyndi voted for Obama, then Hillary Clinton, but Trump in 2020 and 2024 because she says being a parent and owning a business have made her more
conservative. Tariffs on coffee and paper goods hurt their bottom line. But they say Trump deserves more time for things to settle. Both like the
president's crackdown on illegal crossings, but aggressive deportation roundups give them pause.
CYNDI CORTES, TENNESSEE VOTER: The means at which we're getting there is difficult, is not comfortable to watch, and it has definitely affected
Latin American communities.
KING (voice-over): Cyndi's 2026 thinking is important. She voted for Republican Andy Ogles in 2024, but hopes he loses in the GOP primary next
year.
C. CORTES: I can't put a vote for a candidate that I just don't feel just embodies the values that matter to us, and a strong character and honest,
you know, honest character is important.
KING (voice-over): And if Ogles wins the primary?
C. CORTES: I'm not opposed to voting for a Democratic candidate.
KING (voice-over): Parnassus Books is in the Fifth District slice of Nashville. Lisa Quigley lives a few miles away in the Seventh District's
piece of the city. She was chief of staff to the last Democrat to represent Nashville when it was all one district. He was a centrist and Quigley's
experience tells her moderates have a better shot in the suburbs and the rural counties. But a surge of energy among progressives in the special
election was eye-opening.
LISA QUIGLEY, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: And when they turned to see who our nominee was, it was somebody who was fighting, who was talking about
affordability, who was very aggressive, and voters here like that.
KING (voice-over): Quigley says, the new Democratic energy here is real and predicts crowded primaries for the House seats. Yes, that just about
guarantees tension between Democratic liberals and moderates. But Quigley believes at least two of the three House seats can be competitive.
You think there's something in the water?
QUIGLEY: There's something happening, there's something happening. And so, as long as we are smart enough to put our best players on the field, I
think we're going to be able to take advantage of that. And I think that next November is going to be a big year for us.
KING (voice-over): Country and Western go together here. Democrats and optimism usually do not. So it may turn out to be all hat, no cattle, but
at the moment, Democrats see a chance for a Music City comeback.
John King, CNN, Nashville.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GIOKOS: All right. We're going to a very short break. I'll be back right after this. Stick with CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:50:55]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: All we will host the first ever Patriot Games, an unprecedented four-day athletic event featuring the
greatest high school athletes, one young man and one young woman from each state and territory.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GIOKOS: Well, President Trump there announcing the first ever Patriot Games. The games will be held as part of the celebration of America's 250th
anniversary. Some Democrats have mocked the plan for the games. California Governor Gavin Newsom compared them to the "Hunger Games" series of books
and films. On social media he posted a clip from the movie, along with a quote from the "Hunger Games," "May the odds be ever in your favor."
President Trump's social media business surprising many Thursday with the announcement of plans to merge with the nuclear fusion company. Trump Media
and technology group agreeing to a $6 billion deal with the privately owned TAE Technologies. It's a bet on potentially lucrative but still unproven
energy technology.
CNN's Clare Duffy explains.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CLARE DUFFY, CNN TECH CORRESPONDENT: I think it's really important to put into context here what exactly nuclear fusion is. This is an unproven
technology. It's something that some in the energy sector and in Silicon Valley think could be a lucrative, cheaper source of energy that could help
fill America's energy gap at a time when the country is increasingly desperate for new energy sources as we build out more A.I. data centers.
But this is Trump Media making a bet on a speculative technology. Most people, you ask, say fusion is likely decades away from potentially being
commercially viable. And in some ways, this follows a trend that we've seen Trump Media take with bets on things like crypto. The company talked about
wanting to diversify into artificial intelligence earlier this year, and for TAE Technologies, this nuclear firm, this is going to provide them with
an infusion of capital and also boost their public profile at a time when they are trying to take this from vision to reality.
Trump Media is expected to invest an initial $300 million in cash into this nuclear project. And of course, going public could also help with those
capital needs, too. But I think there are also important conflict of interest questions here because President Trump has talked about wanting to
remove red tape, speed up regulatory reviews for new nuclear facilities, and as a new technology, nuclear fusion is going to rely on approvals from
the federal government.
Now, our Matt Egan did ask this question of TAE CEO Michael (INAUDIBLE), who talked about the fact that he doesn't worry that this is going to make
his company more politically controversial. He said, "I'm not looking for anything special. Perhaps you get more scrutinized from a regulatory
perspective, and that's good because it will give the world confidence that the technology is what matters."
But I think if you're somebody who's worried about nuclear safety, what you're actually concerned about is that this company will face less
regulatory scrutiny because of its ties to the White House. So that's going to be a really interesting thing to watch as this plays out, although
again, nuclear fusion far from being a commercial reality.
Back to you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GIOKOS: All right. Clare Duffy there for us.
Now, two of Hollywood's biggest stars sit down for the grand finale of "Actors on Actors." Among the revelations, Leonardo DiCaprio tells Jennifer
Lawrence that he's never rewatched "Titanic." The two Oscar winners also discussed their upcoming movie with director Martin -- with their lives as
kids on sitcoms and their good and bad habits as actors. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JENNIFER LAWRENCE, ACTOR: I think that the creative part of my brain and the political part of my brain are intrinsically linked. Like I keep
finding like every time I come up with like a movie or like I'm at -- it's more often than not political. I think it's because that's how I'm, like,
digesting the world. Are you like that?
LEONARDO DICAPRIO, ACTOR: No.
LAWRENCE: OK. Next.
DICAPRIO No, no. But this was an interesting one because he wrote this 15 years ago, and it kind of feels --
LAWRENCE: Yes.
DICAPRIO Very topical.
LAWRENCE: Totally.
DICAPRIO And, you know, as we know, we did "Don't Look Up" together.
[10:55:02]
It's very difficult to say something about the world we live in. And it has to have an element of irony or comedy to it. Otherwise, people, they're not
allowed in. You know what I mean? It feels like, oh, I'm watching these people's vocation. And they, you know, do I relate to them?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GIOKOS: And you can stream all episodes of "Actors on Actors" on the CNN app.
And finally, boxing fans are getting excited about Anthony Joshua's return to the ring. The former World Heavyweight champion takes on the social
media influencer Jake Paul in Miami tonight. 36-year-old Joshua hasn't fought professionally since 2024. The fight will consist of eight three-
minute rounds. Official figures have not been released, but both men are expected to walk away with tens of millions of dollars win or lose. That's
absolutely amazing.
All right, well, that's it for CONNECT THE WORLD. I'm Eleni Giokos in Dubai. Stay with CNN. "ONE WORLD" is up next. From me, have a fantastic
weekend and I'll see you back on Monday.
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END
