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Early Start with Rahel Solomon
Venezuela Mobilizes Militias As Us Deploys Navy To Region; U.K. Agrees To Pay Kenyans Affected By Lolldaiga Fire; TikTok Employees Raise Concerns About App's Impact On Users. Aired 4:30-5a ET
Aired August 22, 2025 - 04:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to Early Start. Half past the hour now. I'm Erica Hill in New York. Venezuela is mobilizing millions of militia members as the United States deploys more military forces to the region. The U.S. says the increased military presence is an attempt to crack down on drug trafficking. Patrick Oppmann has more.
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PATRICK OPPMANN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONENT (voice-over): A major show of force in South America. At least three U.S. Navy destroyers, attack aircraft, amphibious landing vehicles, and more than 4,000 Marines.
The Trump administration says it's meant to crack down on drug smuggling from the region to the U.S. and intimidate Venezuela's embattled leader, Nicolas Maduro, who has responded by calling up more than 4 million militiamen to defend against any possible U.S. aggression.
The White House alleges Maduro is the head of a shadowy cocaine trafficking empire known as El Cartel de los Soles, a criminal organization secretly operated by Venezuela's military.
This month, the administration doubled the reward for Maduro's capture to $50 million.
KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The Maduro regime is not the legitimate government of Venezuela. It is a narco-terror cartel.
And Maduro it is the view of this administration, is not a legitimate president. He is a fugitive head of this cartel who has been indicted in the United States for trafficking drugs into the country.
OPPMANN (voice-over): Now, U.S. Navy ships approaching Venezuela are putting Maduro on notice.
The deployment may just be a show of force. But one that Venezuela's leader vows to resist.
Maduro denies the drug smuggling accusations and says his government will fight until the last bullet.
NICOLAS MADURO, VENEZUELAN PRESIDENT (through translator): We must defend Venezuela, because they want to turn us into slaves of supremacists due to the racist contempt they have for us.
OPPMANN (voice-over): Maduro, who counts Russia and Iran as allies, say he's mobilizing his military and militia across the country to ensure any U.S. action would be drawn-out and bloody.
MADURO (through translator): No empire is going to set foot on the sacred soil of Venezuela.
OPPMANN (voice-over): Despite the saber rattling on both sides, it's clear the U.S. forces deployed would not be sufficient for regime change, says a former U.S. official who has studied what an invasion of Venezuela would look like.
FRANK MORA, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN STATES: We're talking about 200, 250,000 troops, because it's not just a question of bringing the regime down. That would not be that difficult.
The invasion becomes an occupation, and that gets very complicated, because how do you maintain social order in a country where the government has collapsed?
OPPMANN (voice-over): This is not the first time the U.S. has vowed to oust Maduro. In 2019, during the first Trump administration, a U.S.- backed uprising of dissident Venezuelan soldiers led to fighting in the streets of the capital, Caracas, between pro- and anti-government forces.
But that would-be coup failed. Maduro emerged with a tighter grip on power and even more defiant of U.S. attempts to end his rule. Patrick Oppmann, CNN.
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HILL: Brazilian police say former President Jair Bolsonaro once again once planned rather to request political asylum in Argentina. That's document seen by the Associated Press. Police say Bolsonaro drafted a document requesting asylum two days after they searched his home in Connecticut in connection with his current criminal trial. Bolsonaro is accused of attempting to overturn Brazil's presidential election three years ago.
A parole board in California has denied Erik Menendez's parole request on Thursday. This after 10 hours of virtual hearings. Erik Menendez and his brother Lyle were convicted in the notorious 1989 murders of their parents.
They were originally sentenced to life in prison without parole, but they became eligible for release after a judge resentenced them in May. The board said Erik Menendez, however, continues to, quote, pose an unreasonable risk to public safety. The decision does not bode well for Erik's brother Lyle, who is set to
have his own parole hearing later today. Regardless of any parole recommendation, California's governor would have the final word on whether they are released or stay in prison.
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Years after a devastating fire, Kenyans continue to demand justice from the British army. Still ahead here, how the aftermath of that blaze continues to haunt one community in Kenya.
Plus, Hurricane Erin moving away now from the U.S. East Coast. The threat of flooding, however, from the storm isn't over yet. An update for you after the break.
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HILL: At least 14 people were killed in two separate incidents in Colombia which authorities say were terrorist acts. Take a look at the scene here. This is after an explosion near a military base in Cali on Thursday. The Colombian military say a car bomb there killed at least six people and injured some 50 others. Also on Thursday, eight people were killed when a police helicopter crashed after a drone attack.
Now it's unclear whether the events are related. Colombia's President Gustavo Petra used the incidents though to call for drug trafficking gangs to be designated as terrorists.
Hurricane Erin is now moving away from the United States along though more than a thousand miles of the East Coast. The danger isn't over. While the storm did not make landfall, it did stir up life threatening rip currents that prompted dozens of rescues, especially in North Carolina's Outer Banks.
The National Weather Service as parts of southern New Jersey and southern Delaware could see major coastal flooding through Friday. And there's a higher risk of rip current that will likely remain through the weekend. Meantime, a tropical storm warning is in effect still for Bermuda.
Flames from a wildfire in Portugal suddenly changing direction on Thursday and engulfed a vehicle. You see it there. A firefighter was inside the vehicle at the time. Authorities say the firefighter did suffer severe burns but survived. More than 1,600 firefighters are battling these wildfires in central and northern Portugal, fires that have now killed at least three people in just the past week.
European Officials estimate some 274,000 hectares or 677,000 acres of vegetation have burned. It is southern Europe's worst fire season in 20 years.
The British government has agreed to pay compensation after its troops sparked a huge forest fire while training in Kenya. Locals, however, say that is not enough to deal with the aftermath of an ecological disaster that continues to affect them to this day. CNN's Larry Madowo spoke to some of the families who waged this legal battle against the British Army.
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LARRY MADOWO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A forest fire raging through the hills of central Kenya in 2021 burning over 10,000 acres of protected land and smoldering the local community with toxic smoke.
The British army posted this video at the time of the troops tackling the blaze.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The local community behind us is safe and we're also quite aware that there's wildlife that we need to protect.
MADOWO (voice-over): Those words now jarring as neither the community nor the wildlife were ultimately kept safe.
The British government has agreed to pay out nearly $4 million to thousands of locals whose lives were changed forever by the fire, according to a settlement agreement obtained by CNN.
The blaze in the Lolldaiga Hills started during a training exercise of the British military inside a privately owned wildlife conservancy.
Speaking to me before the settlement was agreed, activist James Mwangi says the fire wrecked the environment and harmed people far outside the area.
JAMES MWANGI, LOCAL ACTIVIST: This area in 2021 March, it was a furnace. For seven days over 10,000 people were choked by smoke. That toxic smoke nearly everyone in this community has chest problems. Everyone.
MADOWO (voice-over): This is now our life, this woman told me, showing her inhaler. Hannah Wanjiku starts crying when she tells me about the sick grandchildren she is struggling to raise.
My grandchildren are all unwell, Hannah told me. Even I can no longer read and I've developed chest problems. She says, we live a difficult life.
Hannah, like so many members of the community, says she wants to use any compensation money she receives to leave the area and get away from the British forces. Kenya earns about $400,000 annually for allowing the British army to train here.
KELVIN KUBAI, LAWYER FOR VICTIMS: We actually went to court.
MADOWO (voice-over): This 27-year-old lawyer grew up in the area and filed a class action lawsuit against the British army after the fire.
KUBAI: Military training and conservation are incompatible. There is need to separate both of them. My client expected much more money from this payment, but this payment is nowhere close to give them the financial assistance to enable their move from this training. MADOWO (voice-over): The British government has agreed to compensate more than 7,000 people whose lives were impacted by the smoke and flames, but they have refused to admit liability and have blocked locals from pursuing any further claims relating to the fire.
Many people here have been campaigning for years for justice. Some will receive just $170, their lawyer says. The British government said Thursday it was, quote, pleased that a global settlement has been agreed, saying that the Lolldaiga fire was extremely regrettable.
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Many here tell us the behavior of troops from the former colonial power is becoming too much to tolerate.
Larry Madowo, CNN, Laikipia, Kenya.
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HILL: Panic breaking out at Milan's main airport Wednesday after a man reportedly set a check in counter and fire. You see the blaze there in the background on your screen. Police say he poured gasoline on the counter and then lit it, leaving at least one person injured.
The suspect also smashed monitors with a hammer causing some people to take cover because they noise was gunfire. The 28-year-old man from Mali was tackled by police and is now facing charges related to property damage. Officials say he was hospitalized the day before when he launched a separate attack involving a hammer but managed to escape from the emergency room.
Some TikTok employees have apparently been concerned that app is addictive and could hurt young users' mental health. Those details after a quick break.
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HILL: TikTok has often claimed its platform is safe for young people. But we're now learning from new video evidence in a North Carolina court case that current and former TikTok employees have raised concerns about how the app's popular algorithm could impact the mental health of teenagers. CNN's Clare Duffy has more.
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CLARE DUFFY, CNN TECH REPOTER: This video is part of a lawsuit that was filed by North Carolina last year against TikTok, accusing the company of designing the app to be, quote, highly addictive for young people, also accusing it of misleading parents and young people about the safety of the platform.
A judge ruled on Tuesday that this video should be unsealed and that the public should be able to see it. And I want to play for you a clip showing just a few of these employee comments because I think it's really striking to hear it directly from them. Take a listen.
BRETT PETERS, TIKTOK GLOBAL HEAD OF CREATOR ADVOCACY AND REPUTATION: We all have these really lofty goals of getting people to be on the app longer, like, literally. Like, that's, like, why we're all here is to help continue to diversify the content ecosystem to make TikTok a place where you can get so much different types of content that you never want to leave.
NICHOLAS CHNG, TIKTOK, FORMER ISSUES PROGRAM MANAGER: Unfortunately, some of the stuff that people find interesting are not always the most healthy. So I think we do have -- we do, in a way, encourage some of this content being put up.
ALLY MANN, TIKTOK, CREATOR LEAD MARKETING: We obviously wanted people to spend as much time as possible on TikTok, which is, can be in contrast to what is best for your mental health.
DUFFY: Now, it's worth noting that we don't know exactly when these comments were made, and it's also not totally unusual for internal teams at tech companies to have conversations about how to improve their platforms.
But North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson said he thinks this underscores the claims that they're making in this lawsuit. He tells me these videos prove what we've argued in court. Social media companies are keeping kids hooked to maximize profits, even at the expense of their health.
Now, TikTok has pushed back against the claims in this lawsuit and is also pushing back against the Attorney General's characterization of this video and these comments. A spokesperson told me the AG civil sizzle reel is a shameful attempt to distort an open internal conversation about making the platform safer when TikTok was just beginning five years ago.
This manipulation relies on conversations taken out of context with the sole purpose of misleading the public and grandstanding. The spokesperson also pointed to some of the youth safety features that TikTok has rolled out in recent years, everything from parental oversight tools to a meditation feature the platform recently introduced to try to keep young people from scrolling so much on the platform.
But I do think it's going to be interesting to watch how this video plays into this North Carolina court battle, but also a number of lawsuits that have been filed against the company in states across the country. Clare Duffy, CNN, New York.
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HILL: Buried beneath the waves for hundreds of years, relics of ancient city have now started to resurface in Egypt. On Thursday, crews working in the waters off Alexandria helped to hoist large statues and other artifacts from a sunken city dates back more than 2,000 years. Egyptian officials say there is evidence the site may have been an
extension of the ancient city of Canopus. Once a thriving port city along the Nile delta that's near present day Alexandria, the city was sunk by natural dis in the 8th century.
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MOHAMED ISMAIL, SECRETARY GENERAL, SUPREME COUNCIL OF ANTIQUITIES (through translator): These artifacts confirm the study that says that Alexandria was submerged by water as a result of a major earthquake or tsunami. This is why all the statues are missing the head and feet, which are the weakest parts of the statues. But the core of the body is the largest part of the statue, so it falls directly into the water.
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HILL: Recent research has shown the modern day city of Alexandria and the areas around it are especially vulnerable to rising sea levels driven by the global climate crisis. And that could leave large parts of the region underwater or uninhabitable within just the next three decades.
A secret involving the seventh planet from the sun revealed. Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have spotted a tiny moon whirling around Uranus. It is the 29th known moon orbiting the gorgeous blue green ice planet.
Scientists found it in February by taking a series of long exposure images with an infrared camera.
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They say it is a significant find here because the Voyager 2 spacecraft missed it in its flyby 40 years ago. It is thought that the moon and the planet's faint rings may have a common origin. And scientists say Uranus may have even more undiscovered moons.
The woman reputed to be the world's oldest living person turned 116 on Thursday. Ethel Caterham celebrating the milestone with her family in Surrey, England. She has three granddaughters, five great grandchildren. Born in 1909. She's the second youngest of eight children according to Guinness World Records. She said the key to a long life is making friends through a hobby you love.
Thanks so much for joining us for this hour of Early Start. I'm Erica Hill in New York. I'll see you at the top of the hour with more news.
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