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Quest Means Business
CDC in Chaos After Trump Fires Director Susan Monarez; De Minimis U.S. Tariff Loophole Set to Expire Friday; Kremlin Wages Deadly Aerial Assault on Kyiv; E.U. Proposes Removing Tariffs on U.S. Imports; Two Children Killed and 18 People Wounded in Catholic School Attack; Top NYC Bar Turns to Crowdfunding for Expansion. Aired 4-5p ET
Aired August 28, 2025 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[16:00:11]
RICHARD QUEST, CNN INTERNATIONAL HOST, "QUEST MEANS BUSINESS": Closing bell ringing on Wall Street and what an interesting session, down in the
morning, up in the afternoon and a strong rally towards the close of the business.
So an interesting market. The numbers aren't very high, but the trend was clearly there. Yes. Come on, sir, please. One, two. Oh, that was a bit1 For
Texas, that was a very little tepid tap of the gavel. But as you can see, those are the markets and these are the main events of the day.
It is up to the judges now. President Trump's battle to remove a sitting Fed governor will go to court.
After a major Russian air assault on Ukraine, the German Chancellor throws cold water on the idea of a meeting between Presidents Putin and Zelenskyy.
One of New York's hottest cocktail bars will name a drink after you. You just have to invest $50,000.00.
Tonight, live from London on Thursday. It is August the 28th. I am Richard Quest and I mean business.
Good evening.
The U.S. President is continuing to upend key areas of the American government that have long been shielded from overtly partisan politics.
First, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC in chaos after the director, Susan Monarez, was abruptly fired. Now, bearing in mind
she was Donald Trump's pick and only sworn in less than a month ago. Apparently she clashed with the Health Secretary, Robert Kennedy over
vaccine policy and other matters. At least three other top officials have now resigned, and in the last hour, CDC staff held a sendoff ceremony for
their former colleagues or now former colleagues.
Susan Monarez says she has refused to put politics over public health. The White House says that's why she had to go.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Look what I will say about this individual is that her lawyer's statement made it abundantly clear
themselves that she was not aligned with the President's mission to make America healthy again, and the Secretary asked her to resign. She said she
would. And then she said she wouldn't, so the President fired her, which he has every right to do.
It was President Trump who was overwhelmingly reelected on November 5th. This woman has never received a vote in her life, and the President has the
authority to fire those who are not aligned with his mission.
A new replacement will be announced by either the President or the Secretary very soon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUEST: Now, The White House also says it will fight to remove Fed Governor Lisa Cook. This is the 24-page lawsuit that she has filed in federal court,
trying to stop President Trump from firing her. Mr. Trump says he is removing Cook for cause after she was accused of mortgage fraud.
Cook's lawsuit calls that allegation a pretext, saying she has been denied due process. Her lawyers have asked for an emergency hearing to keep her on
board.
The case likely to be held on Friday, which could determine the future of the Fed's independence.
So we have a President targeting the CDC and the Fed.
To some extent, both are meant to be above partisan politics. The Fed certainly more so. Both are vital to the nation's well-being, both health
and financially.
Phil Mattingly is in Washington.
It doesn't matter, Phil. I mean, we will get into the cause bit in just a moment, but just put the two together. The CDC and the Fed, it doesn't
matter if the President wants them gone, they're gone!
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CHIEF U.S. DOMESTIC CORRESPONDENT: There is a difference between the two. I think this is really critical to understand
when you talk about the President's expansive view and use of executive authority that we've seen throughout the course of the first eight months
of his second term. They have been very successful, The White House and the Justice Department in making their case and winning on the issue of firing
presidentially appointed and Senate confirmed appointees at what we have always known Richard as independent agencies.
Almost without fail, up and down the line, he has been able to do so. He has done it and then proceeded to win in court. The Supreme Court recently
just held up another one. The difference here is there have been several different moments where the Supreme Court has weighed in, even the most
conservative, even those who back a more expansive use of executive authority, where the Federal Reserve is different, it is unique to use one
word that's often used.
It is something that needs to be held in a different place than independent agencies and that is the reason why, up until Monday, for 111 years, no
president has walked down this path.
[16:05:10]
QUEST: Now the difference though with the Fed is, he does have the power to fire for cause, and I've been reading the lawsuit. Cause is generally
assumed to be a specific finding of inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.
Now, I am guessing and you know, having done law myself, I am guessing there is going to be a huge amount of attention focused on whether this
spurious allegation about mortgage fraud, which is by no means even alleged properly, let alone proven, comes within that definition -- inefficiency,
neglect of duty or malfeasance in office.
MATTINGLY: It is everything. Honestly, when you talk to experts in Constitutional Law on all sides of the debate here, they acknowledge it
comes down to this. What is the burden of that? Is the fact that the allegations are related to Lisa Cook's time before she was at the Fed? Who
gets to decide what the burden of for cause is here?
It is -- the reason why I think it is really fascinating on some level, but also completely unknown is because there is no case law on this. There is
no precedent. There is no -- well, this Supreme Court Justice feels this way about executive authority. So you should expect he is going to rule
this way because of how even on those who support an expansive use of executive authority, they have often almost every single one of the
conservatives on the court has written something or been on an opinion that explicitly points out that the Fed needs to be independent, the Fed needs
to be treated differently than other different agencies.
Those three words are three kind of definitions of for cause that you cited, Richard. The interesting part about this when you talk to
professors, when you talk to people inside the process here is there have been many opportunities, I think, for the courts to weigh those on an
independent agency basis. There never has been on the Fed.
And so going into this, the fact that there is a very clear for cause purpose that the administration has locked on to, it is why Lisa Cook is
here and Jerome Powell has never been, despite the President's threat; however, the type of allegations, what the President has said beforehand,
the pretext is, as you note, and whether or not just allegations with no conviction, with no indictment, even no charges brought, whether that meets
the burden, nobody really seems to know right now
QUEST: And you and I are going to end up pretzelling ourselves over the days and weeks and months ahead, trying to get ahead of all of this and
understand it.
Grateful for you tonight, sir. As always, thank you.
Now, Dr. Jonathan Reiner joins me from Washington.
We leave the Fed to one side. Your bailiwick is the CDC. When we are talking here -- you've got lots of contacts in the CDC. They must be in
chaos at the moment. Bearing in mind, obviously, the horrible shooting, the low morale, the 600 that were fired and now the firing of the CDC head and
the variety of other leaders resigning.
DR. JONATHAN REINER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Well, I think chaos is the perfect word, Richard. What I think most people need to understand is that
the CDC is comprised of public servants who, work really independent of politics. Many of the people who work at CDC have been there for decades,
spanning multiple administrations, Republican and Democrat and they work to preserve and protect the health of Americans.
One of the problems with America's pandemic response five years ago is that it became politicized. And now what we are seeing is vaccine policy in the
United States hopelessly politicized, and this is what has led to the firing of Dr. Monarez and the departure of four of her top leaders.
QUEST: But, I mean, the President has the right to do it. And I mean, he might look foolish as he is firing somebody who is only just appointed. But
where are we, in a sense, in public health crises at the moment? I mean, there is no pandemic, there is no Ebola. There are other things lurking
around. But is there a pressing health crisis that the CDC should be concentrating on, that it won't be?
REINER: Yes. Well, first of all, vaccine policy is important to the to the health of this country. You know, the most recent controversy relative to
COVID vaccine policy relates to vaccination of pregnant women and vaccination of infants and children, and the current civilian leadership of
HHS, RFK, Jr. who has never been trained in Medicine, has never been a scientist, hasn't run a clinical trial.
[16:10:07]
And really has no expertise in this matter unilaterally and without input from CDC made vaccine policy as it pertains to pregnant women and children.
And one other point that I would --
QUEST: Sure, go ahead. Please, forgive me. Forgive me.
REINER: One other point that I would make is that -- I'm sorry.
QUEST: Can I just ask you the -- at the end of the day, though, forgive me, we've got a bad connection and so I don't want viewers to think I am being
rude, at the end of the day, though, President Trump was elected thumping majority, the Republicans in Congress approved RFK. There is an argument
that says fine, a plague on all your houses. You've got what you -- you're going to get exactly what you set out to get.
You elected him, you got that Secretary. The Republicans in Congress voted for it. Good luck to you.
REINER: Well, look, I think health policy should be independent of politics. One of the points I was actually going to make a moment ago is
that the outgoing head of CDC's Office of Respiratory Diseases and Immunology stated that during the last several months, not a single expert
from his group, and this is the group that is focused on respiratory viruses and infections, not a single group, not a single member, was asked
to brief the secretary of HHS on immunization practice.
So how is it possible that the Secretary of HHS, who we know has preexisting biases against vaccines, makes vaccine policy without the input
of HHS?
This should be completely devoid of politics. The only thing that should count is what the science says. But what we are seeing, you know, coming
out of HHS is they don't care what the science says. They only care what the politics says
QUEST: I'm grateful to you tonight, Doctor. Thank you very much. Apologies for the poor connection that we have between us, but thank you for joining
us. Thank you.
Now, there is a little loophole in American law that has allowed an entire industry to never mind start, grow and thrive. Basically, cheap goods have
been entering the United States duty free. And all that comes to an end tomorrow, on Friday. It is known as the de minimis exemption, and it is
applied to international shipments worth less than $800.00. Those small orders have become big business because of online shopping, and now they're
going to be subject to tariffs.
Anna Cooban, whose Latin is always close to her heart, is with me. De minimis?
ANNA COOBAN, CNN BUSINESS AND ECONOMICS REPORTER: Well, I am going to give you a bit of a Latin lesson tonight, Richard. So de minimis translates into
something that is lacking in significance or value. But I think I would disagree based on just how important this rule has been to, as you said,
this burgeoning global e-commerce industry.
So that rule, the lifting of this duty free loophole that all of these small parcels will have has allowed companies like SHEIN, eBay, Amazon,
Temu to connect American customers with sellers all around the world, and that is kind of the point, because President Donald Trump, one of the
reasons that he is lifting this exemption tomorrow is because he really wants to boost American manufacturing. He wants American buyers to be
paired with American sellers.
So to give you a sense of the scale of this, the last financial year, you've got U.S. Customs and Border Protection, they have estimated that
1.36 billion parcels that fit under this exemption flowed into the United States, and that really will cover the gamut of all the things that you
could possibly buy online, all of the things that have gone viral recently, you can't buy a Labubu, a real one anyway, that hasn't been made in China.
You can't buy really popular South Korean skincare products not from South Korea, at least the authentic ones. So this is really going to hit American
consumers quite hard, and that's because many of these costs will be passed on directly to the consumer.
So let's look at some of the tariff rates. So for a country whose overall tariff rate imposed by the U.S. is 16 percent or less, there may be a flat
$80.00 fee added to that parcel charge, and then if you're a country where the seller has -- that country has an overall tariff value of between 16
percent and 25 percent, you've got $160.00 added on to that.
And then if you're a country that has a 25 percent or above tariff, you're going to have a $200.00 extra charge added on to that. And so, you know,
India, for example, Brazil, they have a 50 percent tariff overall on their goods from the United States.
So the other problem is that these parcels may not even arrive because we've seen over the past few days many international shipping organizations
temporarily suspend shipments to the United States.
[16:15:10]
And what they are saying is that essentially, they're confused, Richard. They don't know how they're going to collect all of these extra duties.
They don't have a system in place already to do so, and so what they're doing at the moment is simply pausing shipments, so Americans can, if they
want to be doing some retail therapy, maybe paying a lot more and waiting a lot longer.
QUEST: I am very grateful. De minimis -- I guess, it all happens tomorrow. The effect is going to be quite dramatic quite quickly.
COOBAN: Yes, exactly. And if you're somebody that's already bought something that is in transit, it may be the case that that is now going to
be stuck at a border or a port in the United States. So you may be waiting longer for that product that you bought a few weeks ago.
QUEST: Thank you very much. De minimis.
Ahead on this program, Russia last night launched its second largest air assault on Ukraine since the war began. We will have that in a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: The German Chancellor saying it is now obvious that a meeting between Ukrainian President Zelenskyy and Russian's Vladimir Putin is not
happening.
Chancellor Merz had credited President Trump with persuading the Russian President to meet Zelenskyy, but overnight, Kyiv was hit with the Kremlin's
largest assault since Mr. Trump sat down with the Russian leader in Alaska last month.
At least 21 people, including four children, killed.
Melissa Bell reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Kyiv under attack once again with Russia unleashing over 600 air attack weapons
on the Ukrainian capital, killing more than a dozen people, including at least four children in what appears to be the second biggest aerial attack
since Russia's full scale invasion of Ukraine. Footage from the ground shows families huddling for safety as missiles fall on buildings across the
city.
Search teams still digging through the rubble around buildings hit in the strike, with the full extent of the damage still being assessed, families
are still searching for their loved ones.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): When I came out, everything was covered in dust and smoke. I looked up, the roof was gone and the floors
from the fourth to the first were completely destroyed. As of now, my wife hasn't been found.
[16:20:03]
BELL (voice over): Some of those damaged buildings belonged to the European Union and the British Council. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy
calling the strike a clear response from the Kremlin to calls for ceasefire talks and for diplomacy between the two countries.
Russia says it is still interested in peace talks, but its so-called Special Military Operation is still ongoing, a conflict that continues to
shake Kyiv residents.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): God forbid anyone ever has to go through this. You know, my worldview has changed. You realize that you
survived, that you're alive, and that alone is already something.
BELL (voice over): Melissa Bell, CNN, Paris.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
QUEST: Sir Simon Fraser is the former Head of the U.K. Foreign Office and a founding partner of Flint Global, he joins me now.
How much more does Putin have to do to Donald Trump before Donald Trump actually responds and does something like he keeps threatening? Fourteen
days will do it, 21 days will do it.
SIR SIMON FRASER, FORMER HEAD OF THE U.K. FOREIGN OFFICE AND A FOUNDING PARTNER OF FLINT GLOBAL: Well I mean, Donald Trump thinks that he has got a
relationship with Putin and that Putin wants to do a deal, and that's where he is mistaken, it seems to me, and it is true that Putin seems to have
been playing trump on this, and the other side of that is, I don't think that American diplomacy has really been properly thought through.
There isn't really a plan or a set of coherent proposals on the American side. So where this will go, I don't know, but I think we should prepare
ourselves for this war to continue.
QUEST: But at some point, Donald Trump's ego will be affected and he will say, this man is making a fool of me.
FRASER: Well, do you think so? I don't know how Donald Trump will react. I mean, that may be the case or the other thing that Donald Trump does is he
just moves on to the next issue.
I mean, he takes an issue. He declares he is going to do something with it. The rest of us watch that. Then he says, actually, it is done, and he moves
on. So I don't know how he will react. But at the moment, I would say American diplomacy on Russia-Ukraine is not working very well, and there is
no sign that I can see that Vladimir Putin feels he wants or needs to end the war.
QUEST: We've got a good example of sort of strongmen of the world uniting, Kim, Xi, Putin all getting in together in China. But of course, Trump
hasn't -- won't be there and he will be looking at these three -- these men. These men their countries without any worry.
FRASER: Well, I mean, one of the unintended consequences of American policy is that he is driving these people together, and particularly that applies
to India. India is really a strategic partner of the United States, particularly in relation to China, but now, he has hit India with these
massive new tariffs, which is part of his anti-Russia policy in theory.
But the consequence is that he is pushing India towards China and Russia.
QUEST: Is he not entitled to say to India, though, you want to play in our markets, you want to play with us, we are at war, we are simply at this war
-- you can't have it both ways, India.
FRASER: Well, he can say that if he wants, but you have to deal with the real world. India is a major country. It is a big economy. It has a lot of
interests and it has been improving its relationship with the United States because of its strategic rivalry with China.
And he seems to be pushing it in the opposite direction. It does seem to be rather baffling to me.
QUEST: We have to talk about Iran because it seems like the Europeans are once again saber rattling on that front. To what end?
FRASER: Well, they are implementing the so-called kickback clause on sanctions that comes from the original agreement in 2015, because they
believe that the Iranians are not abiding by the terms of that agreement.
QUEST: They don't care.
FRASER: But, you know, it is a bit odd this because what has happened since then is that Israel and the United States have actually struck the Iranian
nuclear program. So I think what you've got here is the Europeans sort of making a point that they think diplomacy is more important and that they
have a say in this, but in reality, I am not sure what difference it is going to make at this point.
QUEST: Tough question, does anybody listen to Europe?
FRASER: Yes, I think people do listen to Europe and they quite rightly should listen to Europe because it is a very big economy, now --
QUEST: Well, Trump has rolled them over on tariffs. He has managed to successfully get them to overrun NATO. Ukraine, no, he is not -- it is
going anywhere.
FRASER: Well actually, he listened to Europe on Ukraine last week because the Europeans went over there to stop him from apparently shifting towards
some sort of notion of land swaps between Russia and Ukraine, and they stopped it, so they can have effect. But your point is a reasonable one.
They tend to underperform because they are not united, and there isn't a single voice.
QUEST: Why was Tony Blair at The White House for the Gaza -- I mean, not that you may even know, but, you know, I mean, why would he want to -- why
would he want to tie himself to a policy from the administration that is clearly being critical?
FRASER: I don't know why he was there or what actually happened in that meeting, but I do know that Tony Blair does care a lot about the Middle
East. It is an issue that he feels he has knowledge of, so I am not surprised he wanted to be involved, but I think he needs to be careful
because here again, the policies that the United States government is pursuing are pretty unpredictable, and some of them are quite unsavory in
terms of the attitude towards, for example, relocation of Palestinians from Gaza.
So, you know, tread with care.
[16:25:16]
QUEST: As a former top official who is used to policy at the highest levels and let's face it, policy never shifts dramatically, or it didn't used to.
You'd see nuance, you'd read the room, you'd see what might be. It must be quite fascinating for you to see this wholesale shift from one side to the
other, and back again out of the United States, completely unreliable.
FRASER: Well, it used to be more stable, it is true, and we used to have clear relationships, and now it does change. So, for example, the United
States says it is not going to participate in supporting security guarantees for Ukraine, and then a couple of months later it says, actually
we will, and yet it never defines exactly what that means.
So that makes it much more difficult for America's allies, and what they are doing is they have decided to -- they have learned how to deal with
Trump, which is to engage with him to sort of humor him to some extent and to make constructive offers where they can, as, for example, on defense
spending and so to retain some leverage and that's probably the best tactic for now.
QUEST: The best you can get away with and get out of the room without having done any damage.
FRASER: But you need to have a strategic view of where this might go if America's behavior persists like this, because obviously it is not really
stable for the long term.
QUEST: Thank you very much. Very grateful. Thanks for coming tonight. Thank you.
The mayor of Minneapolis says his city is united in grief following a mass shooting. What the police have now learned about the deadly attack on the
prayer service at a Catholic school.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: Hello, I am Richard Quest. Together, we will have a lot more QUEST MEANS BUSINESS.
The former CFO of Allianz, says the next recession will be triggered by politics. Dr Paul Achleitner joins me live.
And one of New York's most popular bars is offering ownership to everyday investors. Chief executive of Death and Co wants to expand and find a
buyer. We'll only drink that after we've had the headlines because this is CNN and here, the news comes first.
Russia has launched its second largest aerial assault on Ukraine since the full scale invasion began. At least 19 people, including four children,
died overnight. Nearly 600 drones and dozens of missiles rained down on the Ukrainian capital. Buildings damaged include those belonging to the E.U.
and the British Council.
The White House says it will fight to remove Fed Governor Lisa Cook. Governor Cook has filed a lawsuit to stop President Trump from firing her.
Mr. Trump says he's removing Cook for cause after she was accused of mortgage fraud. Cook's lawsuits call that allegation a pretext and says
she's been denied due process. Her lawyers have asked for an emergency hearing to keep her on the Federal Reserve Board.
A second round match in the U.S. Open ended with the players exchanging heated words. Jelena Ostapenko says that she was angry that Taylor Townsend
never apologized for winning a point with the help of the net cord. That's considered by many to be bad sportsmanship. Townsend won the match in
straight sets. She said Ostapenko told her she has no class and no education.
The European Union today proposed removing tariffs on U.S. imports. It's the first step in enacting the deal it struck with President Donald Trump
last week, includes lowering the 27.5 percent on autos to 15 percent.
Radically changing trade policy has led to a shift for European business leaders. My next guest certainly is an expert on how to navigate murky
waters.
Paul Achleitner is the former chair of Deutsche Bank's supervisory board for many years. He thinks the next recession will likely be triggered by a
political act. His latest or his first book -- congratulations, sir, on the book, "Accelerate Your Experience."
It's a fascinating way in which you've taken your experience of leadership. And it's not a -- and as you rightly say in the introduction, it's not a
self-help book, but there are definite lessons to be learned that you think you can impart. What would be the most important?
PAUL ACHLEITNER, FORMER SUPERVISORY BOARD CHAIR, DEUTSCHE BANK: So first of all, thank you, Richard, for having me. And I think one of the most
important lessons that -- actually I'd like to avoid the word lesson because those are observations that are meant to trigger reactions from the
readers. I do not believe that you can transfer your experience because your experience is highly subjective and therefore people will react to the
same situation differently. But what you can do is you can accelerate somebody else's experience, and maybe one of the more important
observations to answer your question that I deal with in the book is what I call the illusion of satisfactory underperformance.
QUEST: Now, as I read about that --
ACHLEITNER: To explain --
QUEST: Well, no, no. As I read about that, and this is the idea that you're only benchmarking yourself against your own last best and against the other
competition rather than one's forward potential. But is it possible because where do you get the inward stamina, in a sense, to push further? Most
people don't have it within them.
ACHLEITNER: No. And most companies don't have it within them. And maybe some societies don't have it within them. I mean, listening to everything
that you have discussed with your previous guest, I would argue that Europe and also Germany has lived in the illusion of satisfactory underperformance
for quite a while because we actually have not pushed ourselves hard enough to actually look at the inherent potential that exists.
QUEST: This is fascinating at the moment because the European Union on tariffs seems to be giving up much ground. Germany, arguably under
Chancellor Merz, is going to be re-energized, but the Union still looks for real leadership, which seems to be lacking.
ACHLEITNER: Well, I think one needs to be a little bit careful. One other chapter or observation that I have is what I call the drug of charismatic
leadership. Everybody loves to have a charismatic leader to follow, but in reality, there can be a very dangerous exercise and leadership and
effective leadership, in my view, actually requires structure. It requires systems, organizations, and not just one or two individuals.
QUEST: You'll be well --
ACHLEITNER: At the end of the day -- yes.
QUEST: You'll be well familiar --
ACHLEITNER: At the end of the day, which I like --
[16:35:01]
QUEST: Oh, I'm so sorry. We have this very bad connection.
ACHLEITNER: Go ahead.
QUEST: At the end of the day, you'll be familiar with the Draghi Report, and Mario Draghi's view that Europe just really putting, I'm simplifying
obviously, get your act together or you're going to lose out. Productivity needs to improve and Europe needs to become more impressive. Would you
agree with him?
ACHLEITNER: I totally agree with him. I think the only challenge is that what I call the excellence, the power of excellent execution. I don't think
we've got an issue with defining the problems. I don't think we have a problem in terms of analysis. I don't even think we have a problem in terms
of recommendations. We got an issue of execution. And you know, as they say, execution eats strategy for breakfast. You can have all kinds of nice
ideas. Unless you get this done, it's not going to happen.
QUEST: So what do we need to do?
ACHLEITNER: Every one of us needs to see -- this is the reason that I ended up writing this book. To be blunt, the reason for the book is actually
James Corden. Believe it or not. He doesn't know that. But I was in a private conference a while ago, and after a while he challenged everybody
in the room and he said, I can't believe you all leaders, why are you so negative? Why are you complaining to each other? Why don't you just get up
and fix it?
If you guys can't fix it, who can? So I recognize, this was just after I stepped down from my active leadership roles. So I thought, you know, if I
can't actually do this directly, maybe I can help others to get moving.
QUEST: We appreciate your being with us tonight. And, sir, we invite you to come back in the future when we have these thorny issues to discuss. Thank
you for your time and joining us on QUEST MEANS BUSINESS.
ACHLEITNER: I'm looking forward to that. And thank you.
QUEST: Thank you.
Now, 116. That's how many rifle rounds the Minneapolis police chief says were recovered at the scene of yesterday's Catholic school shooting. He
also says a handgun appears to have malfunctioned, possibly preventing a much worse tragedy. Two young children were killed in the attack, 18 have
been wounded. They were all there gathered in church to pray.
We want to show you video of one father captured as he arrived at the church, searching for his daughters. It captures the moment after the
gunfire erupted. Now, as always, I warn you this is disturbing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where are they? Where's the shooter? Where's the shooter?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No one knows.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh my gosh.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUEST: Police say the shooter died of a self-inflicted gunshot. Now they're investigating the manifesto published on YouTube.
Our chief law enforcement and intelligence analyst, John Miller, joins me.
The only thing I -- you know, this whole business, John, looking at it, the only thing I'm absolutely thank God is that more people, you know, it could
have been so much worse when you hear how he's barricaded, the amount of armaments shooting through the window. People -- this is the miracle. And I
hate using that word in this case because they were at prayer, in a sense, is that it wasn't a great deal worse.
JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, Richard, as far as I can tell based on the indicators investigators are
looking at, when the shooter arrived, the shooter encountered the mass in progress. They believe that was intentional because the shooter wanted the
place to be full before the shooter got there. But what the shooter didn't know, in all likelihood, was when the mass starts, they lock the doors.
Investigators theorize there's a good likelihood that the shooter's actual plan was to go inside the church after barricading the doors from the
outside, opening fire, knowing that if people ran to the emergency exits, they would just be met with smoke bombs he had placed there and wooden
barricades that wouldn't allow the emergency exits to open. He would have had a free, open field of fire to a church crowded with mostly children.
That is not what happened. He may have had to improvise. The shooter may have had to improvise by opening fire from the outside and shooting blind
through the windows, hoping to hit whatever targets he could hit, which was horrific enough.
QUEST: Right. The test will now come. There's two sides. Distinct sides. Firstly, who knew what? What could have been foreseen and how much could
the authorities have prevented this? But the second is almost -- is more depressing. It's what will happen now as a result. And correspondent after
correspondent, analyst after analyst, has said almost nothing is guaranteed to happen as a result.
[16:40:06]
MILLER: Well, that is an American political reality. There was a theory that if members of Congress started getting shot, we would get gun control.
But then Gabby Gifford, a member of Congress, was shot at a campaign stop. And guess what happened? Nothing. There was a theory that if Americans were
gunned down in their movie theaters and malls, that that would be a tipping point. But we had the attack in Aurora, Colorado, during the "Batman"
premiere, and nothing happened, at least on the federal level.
There was an idea that if they started shooting our babies in their kindergarten classes and first grade classrooms, that would certainly break
the logjam there. But that happened in Connecticut, and nothing much happened after that either. So we have emerged as a country where there
seems to be no tipping point that will force the government to do something meaningful. In the meantime then the only thing that you can do right now
is to look for those indicators of someone who is drifting towards the pathway to violence, and tip off law enforcement.
And then there's the challenge of, absent the crime having been committed already, what can they do? They've been working on improving that. But it's
a far cry, and I know that other countries, across Europe and other places, look at us and say, what has happened to these people? In June, people are
shot outside the Jewish Museum in Washington. Employees of the Israeli embassy. A man with Molotov cocktails attacks people later in in that,
Boulder, Colorado.
Then in Minnesota, another attack, then in New York on Park Avenue, another active shooter. Now this again in Minnesota, this has become a weekly
monthly event.
QUEST: John, much as I -- it's depressing to do, but I have to congratulate you on a superb synopsis of the -- of the situation even though it does
have an extremely depressing ring to it. But you've summed it up perfectly. Thank you, John. I'm grateful.
MILLER: Thanks, Richard.
QUEST: This is QUEST MEANS BUSINESS. Good evening to you.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:45:21]
QUEST: "Call to Earth," inspiration comes from anywhere, and often from unexpected places. Today on "Call to Earth," we're going to visit an award-
winning photographer at his home in South Africa. It's a behind the scenes peek at his epic journey, one that showcases the planet's most vital
ecosystems. It's on a scale never documented before.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ZAIN ASHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Greyton, South Africa, about a two-hour drive east from Cape Town, the quaint mountain village is an
idyllic place to slow down and reconnect with nature.
For conservation photographer Thomas Peschak, it's also the kind of backdrop that can inspire life's next great adventure.
THOMAS PESCHAK, CONSERVATION PHOTOGRAPHER: I'm an ocean photographer who has spent, you know, the last 25 years exploring the world's wildest seas
and secret shorelines. But it is only since I moved into these mountains about 12 years ago that I began also falling in love with rivers.
I never would have thought that these rivers here would eventually lead me to spending two years exploring the aquatic underworlds of Amazonia.
ASHER: It's a journey that began in April, 2022, as part of the Rolex and National Geographic Perpetual Planet Amazon Expedition. Over the course of
396 days, Peschak followed seven teams of explorers and scientists from the High Andes in the west to the Atlantic Ocean in the east.
PESCHAK: My mission was to rebrand the Amazon and take it from an ecosystem that most people associate exclusively with trees and forests and monkeys
and macaws, and transform it into an aquatic wonderland.
The Amazon River is also incredibly threatened at the moment. Not only, you know, is this region being impacted by dams but, you know, there are also
threats from overfishing and climate change and pollution from mercury and plastic. Not only is it immense in size, it is also incredibly diverse.
This isn't just a single ecosystem. I mean, the diversity of habitats within the Amazon River basin is as diverse as the habitats you find in the
ocean.
That was clearly one of the most crazy and insane encounters of my life. I just had a half an hour in this river with a lowland tapir.
ASHER: But an expedition of this magnitude starts long before the fieldwork begins. And as a former marine biologist himself, Peschak's preparation was
a deep dive to say the least.
PESCHAK: For the Amazon Project, I read an excess of 1,000 scientific papers. I think I read over 400 books. I spoke to dozens and dozens of
experts in various fields. I tried to arm myself with as much knowledge as possible because that makes me a more informed storyteller.
ASHER: When all was said and done, he had compiled a first of its kind photographic archive of the aquatic and wetland habitats of the Amazon
rainforest. And he returned home reenergized and ready for more.
PESCHAK: After two years of not feeling the sweet embrace of saltwater, my heart grew bigger and fonder for marine ecosystems. And having this break
has really reinvigorated my love for ocean storytelling. And personally, I can't wait to go back to telling marine stories once again. But my
relationship with the Amazon is also not over yet. And there are plenty of places and locations that I can't wait to come back to and to use my
photographs and stories to try to protect these places well into perpetuity.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
QUEST: Another fascinating story from "Call to Earth," and I want to know what you're doing to answer the call, the hashtag is "Call to Earth CNN."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:52:22]
QUEST: To be successful in New York is a bar and have the longevity of two decades. Now one of New York's most popular bars is looking to expand to a
city near you. It's called Death and Co., and it's offering shares to everyday investors. You get a piece of the company, plus perks such as
discounts on drinks and cocktail classes, and all you need to buy in is 1,000 bucks.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
QUEST: Do you really use all these bottles?
SETH HIRAVY, BARTENDER, DEATH AND CO.: Absolutely. We're standing on almost 19 years of cocktail creation and everything has a purpose.
QUEST (voice-over): If you want one of these cocktails that cost more than $20, you'll need to wait. Death and Co. has a waitlist to enter every
night. And if you want to book a reservation, well, that could be weeks.
The company's founder, David Kaplan, told me success came quickly, faster than he was prepared to handle.
DAVID KAPLAN, CEO, DEATH AND CO.: When you're 24 I think ignorance is one of the driving factors that allows you to accomplish things that otherwise
don't particularly make sense. And so I thought it was completely rational to open a business by which I have no experience. I went to school for fine
art in New York, by which it is incredibly complex to or hard to succeed here. I thought that was a fine, fair and easy thing to try to tackle.
QUEST: Were you surprised at how quickly and successful it became?
KAPLAN: I was terrified. Absolutely. We opened up on -- we had our friends and family moment on New Year's Eve of 2006, 2007, and I had no clue,
absolutely no clue. And when I say no clue, I am very, very honest with this. It's not self-deprecating. We were running with an old fashioned cash
register that was in the middle. It was a national cash register that couldn't even take more than $100. And we were running on triplicates.
We had no POS. Literally no idea what we were doing. Five days into January, we were on the front page of "New York Times" Sunday Styles, and
we had a line every day and every night. We were just trying to figure out how to run this business.
QUEST (voice-over): They already have four locations across the country. Now they're opening up more, both in the U.S. and abroad, and breaking into
new areas like the hotel industry. To pay for it all, they're raising money in an unusual way. Accredited investors are being offered perks such as
priority reservations or even a signature cocktail based on, of course, how much money they've invested. And everyday investors can also buy in at
lower levels.
KAPLAN: When we went to raise, we were talking to some large family offices and I quickly realized that this was not the way to raise money, and these
were not the partners that I wanted to have.
[16:55:07]
As nice as they were, they were not the people that allowed us or empowered us or enabled us to still be open every day. And then I went to this open
floor plan office with all these young, super type-A driven folks in what's clearly kind of a tech startup, because that's kind of what crowdfunding
is, almost still. And I was wary at first and quickly understood the incredible power that this could have and how it is so aligned with how
we've grown our business to date that I bought in. And so in 2018, we did our first crowdfund and raised almost $3 million.
QUEST: And you basically, for a thousand bucks, I can buy in.
KAPLAN: For a thousand bucks you can buy in. In the next three to five years we're working to create significant value and then find a buyer to
continue this story on a larger scale.
QUEST: I don't know whether -- I'm certainly impressed by that. I'm certainly impressed by it, but I don't know whether I'm a bit disappointed.
You want to sell out?
KAPLAN: Yes, I know.
QUEST: Take the pejorative, you want to sell out?
KAPLAN: No -- yes. It's -- I think, I think the exit is particularly interesting and I hate -- I do hate the term exit because it really is
selling out.
QUEST: Oh, no, no, no, no. No. Exit is entirely appropriate for a company whose name is Death.
KAPLAN: Oh, fair, fair.
QUEST: I mean, so your ultimate exit is to sell out and be uber rich?
KAPLAN: Well -- I hate that. That's awful. I don't like that at all. I think the --
QUEST: I guess I'm only saying it like that because I'm -- because you've created something. And most people who've created something spend most of
their time telling me how they'll never be able to let their baby go. You are basically saying, in five years I'm shoving the baby out the door.
KAPLAN: Part of my goal, part of my ambition in creating that, you know, exit, be it on brand or not, is to show that this industry can create
phenomenal returns and we can do so while maintaining the integrity of the product, which is incredibly challenging. And people kind of look sideways
at that. But we see it in hotels and we see it in restaurants. We have yet to see it in bars or cocktail bars. And so that is -- that is part of the
reason or the foundational reason why I think that exit is important.
QUEST: It's not a cocktail if it doesn't have an umbrella.
(Voice-over): Kaplan says whatever happens he wants Death and Co. to most certainly stay alive and thrive.
I'm drinking all the profits here. Well, that's really very good.
(Voice-over): Ensuring there'll always be new life for Death and Co.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
QUEST: That was truly delicious. It really was. I had another and another.
I'll have a "Profitable Moment" after the break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: Tonight's "Profitable Moment." There was something wonderfully refreshing about the Death and Co. and the way the CEO just, I mean, a
brilliant guy, great idea. Hit from day one and now wants to exit. In other words, take the money and run. You've got to admire it. But I don't know
whether he's going to find it quite as easy when push comes to shove to actually hand over his baby dead or alive.
And that's QUEST MEANS BUSINESS for tonight. I'm Richard Quest in London. Whatever you're up to in the hours ahead, I hope it's profitable. I'll see
you next week.
END
