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- [00:00]
Christiane Amanpour
CNN's Comedy Quiz show is back. Have I GOT NEWS for you returns tackling the week's top stories, making sense of the mayhem and definitely adding to it. Get ready for a brand new season premiering Saturday, September 6th on CNN.
- [00:16]
Interviewer/Host
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to progressive and save Hundreds of Visit progressive.com to.
- [00:31]
Christiane Amanpour
See if you could save Progressive Casualty.
- [00:34]
Interviewer/Host
Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations. Hello everyone and welcome to Amanpour. Here's what's coming up. Mourners from around the world pay respects to Pope Francis, who's now lying in State at St. Peter's Basilica. @ the Vatican, the former Irish President Mary Macaleese on the importance of continuing Frances church reforms and her own personal fight for progress. Plus, Trump does another u turn to calm markets and people spooked by his trade war. Former Obama adviser David Axelrod here in London is getting an earful wherever he goes. Then Pope Francis extraordinary relationship with a small church inside Gaza. Jeremy diamond reports on the daily phone calls that kept up wartime morale. Plus, Trump's fight against anti Semitism has become fraught for many Jews. Those are the words of Rabbi Sharon Browse, who joins me to discuss America's crackdown on higher education. Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Christiane Amanpour in London. Pope Francis will now lie in State at St. Peter's Basilica until his funeral on Saturday. Crowds are flocking to pay their respects and this marks a pivotal moment for the Catholic Church to continue Pope Francis reforms or revert to strict pre Francis traditionalism. US President Donald Trump says he and the first lady will go to the funeral, announcing we look forward to being there. The event may become more than just a farewell to the pope. World leaders have a lot to discuss with the US President. Trump's strongman, winner take all attitude is in stark contrast, of course, to Pope Francis, who was driven by compassion for the weakest, the poorest, the most vulnerable in society. And he is a native of Argentina. He's ordered seven days of mourning following the pontiff's passing. That is, the president of Argentina has done that. CNN's David Culver is there, touring through the pope's childhood neighborhood and speaking to some of his longtime friends.
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David Culver
Even before he passed away, Pope Francis was memorialized here in his hometown, specifically in Flores, the neighborhood in Buenos Aires that he was raised. You can see tributes once again. We see this all over flowers left outside his childhood home. And they've even got the plaque, El Papa Francisco. This is the house where Pope Francis lived. This is where Pope Francis went to elementary school. And it's still a school. You got students who are leaving for the day. Pope Francis friendships from even secondary school onward, some 75 plus years ago, lasted for decades. And today we actually met up with one of his friends, Oscar Crespo. He says he remembers a moment where they were in religion class and the instructor said, those who have not had your first communion, please stand. And there were two people who stood up. It was Oscar and another individual. And it was offered up that one of the other classmates would take them to have their first communion. And that person was Jorge Bergoglio. Pope Francis legacy stretches across this community, even imprinted on the ground. And just a few blocks from his childhood home, the church he went to as a kid and a teenager, this is the Basilica de San Jose de Flores. But it's what happened inside that really stands out. It says inside this confessional, on September 21, 1953, Jorge Mario Bergoglio had the call from God to become a priest. And now that confessional has become a pilgrimage site of sorts. Throughout the day, people coming in to leave flowers, candles, to offer prayers, just to remember. But it's not just Catholics or even Christians mourning the lost. To start with this, when Omar Aboor, a Muslim, worked alongside then Cardinal Bergoglio and a Jewish counterpart to create the Inter Religious Dialogue Institute for more than 25 years, they built a deep friendship. When was the last time you spoke with him?
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Interviewer/Host
This year, January 23rd.
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David Culver
What did you talk about?
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Interviewer/Host
Many times? AI.
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David Culver
AI?
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Interviewer/Host
Yeah.
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David Culver
Artificial intelligence.
- [05:55]
Interviewer/Host
Yeah.
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David Culver
Omar has been reluctant to do interviews since the Pope's passing. Omar, it's not lost on me that the world has lost a Pope. But you lost a friend.
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Interviewer/Host
He used to be a good friend. All we will miss him. Really? Really. Words are not enough. Okay, Words are not enough. If you want, I prefer to stop here, please.
- [06:30]
David Culver
So it might sound abrupt there as Omar was ending the interview, but it wasn't personal for him. It was a battling of the emotions that were surfacing. And they were doing that several times throughout our conversation with him. And because as the world is mourning the loss of the Pontiff, for him, it's a dear friend. And so he didn't want to make the focus about him. Instead he wanted to keep it focused on the Holy Father. And for that reason, he needed to step aside before he realized the emotions were surfacing too strongly. I asked him if he was going to be able to go to the funeral. He said he, a local rabbi and another Catholic priest plan to travel to Rome, but they'll simply go and personally pay their respects in St. Peter's and then leave before the funeral starts. For them, it's the best way to privately remember their friend.
- [07:25]
Interviewer/Host
And that is a heck of a journey of faith those friends are going to make. Mary MacAleese, the former Irish president and a Catholic herself, praised the Pope's devotion and clear moral authority. And she's been an outspoken advocate for even more church reform. So welcome. Welcome to the program from Ireland. Nice to see you. Where are you exactly?
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Mary McAleese
I'm in North Roscommon.
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Interviewer/Host
There you go.
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Mary McAleese
Not a place with tourists, but close to the very beautiful town, probably one of the nicest towns in Ireland, Carrick on Shannon, which is right on the Shannon, as indeed I am.
- [08:01]
Interviewer/Host
All right, I'm gonna get back to some of the beauty of Ireland and your industries in a moment, but first I want to ask you, you know, he has been described as more and more of a lonely moral voice, a lonely sort of public moral authority. And I just wonder, you know, what you say now, how you're feeling about the passing of. Of this Pope.
- [08:25]
Mary McAleese
Well, I'm not surprised by it. I firmly was expecting it, frankly, particularly given his immediate health history. And when I saw him on the balcony on the day of the Resurrection, on Easter Sunday, I realized immediately that here was a man who was quite determined to spend his very last breath blessing people and getting that message, that urbi ad orbe message to the people, a message about peace, about the poor, about the marginalized, about our. Essentially, I always reduce his. How he speaks to two really important emphatic things. Doesn't really matter what context he's talking, but he reduces everything, really, to the sacredness of the human person and the sacredness of the earth, and then our common responsibility for protecting those and vindicating and embracing those two big responsibilities. So was I surprised by his death? I was not, frankly. I was only surprised that he survived that long trek, not just around the piazza as he has done before, but all the way down the Via della Conciliazione and back up again. And I was watching it almost, to be perfectly frank, horror stricken, because realizing how ill he was, the doing of that certainly, well, as we know, it was not good for his health. Probably in the end, was what lay between him and the stroke that he had. But he didn't care. He had been told by his doctors to go and take two months. Told quite emphatically that he needed two months of rest. And I can imagine he was a gruff man, you know, and there was a kind of a rough side to him, too, an untutored side at times. And I would say his attitude was, to heck with that. I have a job to do and I'm going to die, both in the job and on the job, which is exactly what he did.
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Interviewer/Host
Tell me, you, you've clearly met him, right? Because you say he was a bit of a gruff guy and a bit untutored. Tell me about your interactions with him.
- [10:28]
Mary McAleese
I can't. To say that I met him would be a really gross exaggeration. I've been in his company three times. The first was on the day that he was elected. I was standing right underneath the balcony where Cardinal Toron in that quiet little voice announced habemus papam. And that was our first introduction to the new pope, Pope Francis. So I was there in the square for that. That was quite an occasion. But on the other two occasions that I was in the same space as him, after I left office back in 2011, I went back to student life. I became a student again, and I became a student in the Jesuit university in Rome called the Pontifical Gregorian University. And he invited all the students and the staff from the Gregorian to meet him in the hall, Paolo Sexto in the big hall at the Vatican. And we did. Now, that's where you began to see that he could be gruff. You know, I was an elderly lady, which meant that I was one of very few women in the room. The rest were nearly all priests, seminarians, a few bishops, lecturers, of course, quite a lot of Jesuits, but a lot, most of them or clerics or religions of one sort. He was quite brusque with them. He said, you know, you're not home to be little princes. Get out of your castles and out of your palaces and go meet the poor.
- [11:49]
Interviewer/Host
Well, that's what he did. And now we've lost you. And I had a lot more to ask you. Hopefully. We'll try to get you back in a moment. Later in the program, we are going to take a look at Pope Francis special relationship with with a church in Gaza. And I'll talk to Rabbi Sharon Browse about Trump's crackdown on colleges in the name of anti Semitism. We're going to take a short break now, and we'll be right back.
- [12:18]
Rabbi Sharon Brous
I'm CNN tech reporter Claire Duffy. This week on the podcast Terms of Service, how to choose the Right. Vpn, whether to trust public WI fi, what to do with those annoying cookie pop ups and more. To help me answer these rapid fire questions, I've invited Rachel toback back to the show. You may remember her from our episode about setting and managing your passwords. Rachel is an ethical hacker and the CEO of Social Proof Security where she helps people and companies keep their data Safe. Listen to CNN's terms of service with me, Claire Duffy. Wherever you get your podcast.
- [13:04]
Interviewer/Host
Let'S bring back Mary Macaleese, the former Irish president now. Um, so just before the break, we were talking about France's legacy. I just want to read a little bit about what you wrote in the Irish Times today. You said the sad reality is that Francis talked a good story for the journalists down at the back of the plane. But when it came to putting pen to paper to change magisterial teaching, he took the timid path and left a flip flopping, perplexing legacy which could yet transform into 11, possibly or possibly not. So it depends. Yeah, but you, so you, you are one of those Catholics who are left wanting. Um, that's because you're much more progressive than even the progressive reforms that, that, that he did or the, the, the attitude of more liberal reform.
- [13:54]
Mary McAleese
He wasn't really, when you summarize everything, he wasn't a reformer in the sense of changing church teaching. He changed virtually nothing with the exception, the noble exception of capital punishment, which he took off the statute books, as it were, in the Catholic Church. And that was good. Pope John Paul had initiated that process and Francis finished it. But in relation to major changes in relation to dogma, absolutely not. I mean, it's only little over a year ago that in relation to women priests, not only did he say they couldn't happen, but he also said that the theology in which they were based was rather imperfect. And while it was still being worked out, there was that we, we the faithful, that's people like me, we must accept it. And we were not allowed to publicly contradict it. Now, what that tells me is here was an old school Pope who'd never read the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which says that I and every other human being, by virtue of being human, we have freedom of conscience, freedom of speech, freedom of opinion, freedom of expression. But not in Catholic canon law. We have, according to Catholic canon law, we have an obligation to obedience to the teachings of the Church. Now, that's difficult where you disagree with those teachings. And there are quite a number of teachings that are worth disagreeing with because they are based on an absence human rights and also a failure to fully interrogate issues. The issue, the fundamental issue of where is the place and the role of women in the Church in terms of.
- [15:34]
Interviewer/Host
Can I just ask you about that? Cuz it's clearly something that troubles and interests many, many Catholic women. Apparently just before he died, he left instructions that the process to allow women to be deacons get started. Do you think that is? Awell. That's the first step.
- [15:56]
Mary McAleese
I hadn't heard that. That is news to me. I would be surprised by that. But because there are now three reports that have been lying on his desk for quite some time that he's never published. But if that is the case, that would be quite good news. On the other hand, it is just the diaconate and I don't quite know. I don't know if he's got. If you go down that road of ordination to the diaconate, why wouldn't you go the whole way to ordination to the priesthood? That bothers me that you would put a wall between those two things. But that said, it's a small step. Yes, but I'm not even talking about ordination to the diaconate or to the priesthood. I'm talking about the exclusion of all women. That's 700 million women in the church who make a huge contribution to the church from all decision making and in particular the formulation of teachings, teachings made by celibate men who are invariably bishops. Now that's problematic and that's never been addressed. That bothers me because there's 1.4 billion people in this church, many of them really good researchers, really good intellectuals and academics. Give them the job and they could very easily work out the damage inflicted by misogyny, but also more importantly, the potential of the church or once misogyny evaporates.
- [17:16]
Interviewer/Host
So President Macalees, you know, you are giving voice to, you know, what a lot of people do believe clearly and certainly a lot of Catholic women. But then there's the other side. And we're led to believe that there's a battle for who's going to be the next Pope. Will it be a more traditionalist in the Pope Benedict, you know, mold or not? And so where do you think this is? Because for sure, Pope Francis talked a different game and, and you know, did leave the door open for. As a bridge, so to speak.
- [17:49]
Mary McAleese
But you have to understand the door had already been kicked open and indeed the windows too, by the faithful, by the people. There was, when he came in as Pope, there was already a massive churn within the Church, people leaving in frustration. Obviously, the scandals had literally scandalized a lot of people. But even long before that, going back to Paul VI and Humanae Vitae and the ban on artificial contraception, and then, of course, the massification of education, particularly in the west, produced a much more incisive and intellectually astute laity who started to have their voice. So that was the churn that he inherited. So the doors were already being kicked open. And I think one of his strengths was that he managed to look like he was dealing with that, that he managed to look like he. And just, I think in relation to women, in relation to lgbtiq, he said certain things that helped to keep the pot simmering without actually, you know, without actually producing something, a stew that was edible in the end. But it's just, it's in. It's in progress now. You're quite right to point out, here we are, and there. There are 130 odd men going into the conclave. Well, actually, there'd be over 250 going into the conclave, of whom 130 odd will have a vote. And they'll probably choose someone from within that. 130. They could choose from a much wider realm, of course, but they almost invariably, with only one exception, I think they choose from within that. Now, that's a very, very small pool, and it's not particularly deep. It's not very exciting. You take the whole of Africa, for example, the African cardinals that are there. Some people talk about an African cardinal, and it is true the Church is growing exponentially in Africa. But one of the problems with Africa is it has yet to deal with the issue of clerical abuse, why it denies that it exists in Africa. I heard the Polish bishops saying that some years ago, how wrong they were, the Italians, how wrong they were indeed in Ireland, there was a time when it was. We were in denial how wrong the Church here was and what a lesson we've learned. So it seems to me unlikely that the Pope would come from Africa and Western Europe is hugely problematic because the Church is in an existential crisis. My own personal choice, if I had a choice, which I don't, obviously haven't got a vote, but I would love for it to be the Asian cardinal, Cardinal Taglay, who is in the mold rather of Francis, but a lot more courageous in many ways, he's never allowed the idea that he might be Pope get in the way of what he said. A lot of people sit on the fence. A lot of people are trimmers. They trim their sails to suit the wind, the prevailing wind. So it's hard to find people who are really, I would call, you know, very expressive of their true views, unless they happen to be really very, very right wing. And then you do them, or you don't really hear the liberal voices so much. They tend to be much more muted. I like Cardinal Tagli. I admire and respect him. Cardinal Zuppi from Bologna. Admire and respect. He's a Roman. So if they were looking for an Italian, but, you know, there aren't that. Put it like this. The list is very short. And a number of them are also problematic because they have passed that probably, you know, have things that need still to be scrutinized, and they may, they may not come out of it that well.
- [21:36]
Interviewer/Host
All right. President Mary Macaleese, thank you very much indeed for your reflections. Thank you. We did, in fact, interview Cardinal Taglay. So we're very happy that he's in the running. Thanks so much. Now to the United States and a moment of reckoning over what America stands for these days. Donald Trump, not yet in office for 100 days, is turning the country more inward, gutting foreign aid, slapping tariffs on even its closest allies. The IMF says Trump's trade war will slow the global economic forecast for this year and next year. And polls show that his support on the economy is at its lowest rating ever. Do Democrats see an opportunity here? David Axelrod knows Democratic strategy better than most. He was President Obama's senior advisor. He joined me here in the studio on a visit to London. David Axelrod, welcome to the program.
- [22:28]
Christiane Amanpour
Great to be here.
- [22:29]
Interviewer/Host
So you're here in Europe, in the UK you are the preeminent American political strategist, Democratic strategist. What are you hearing from people here now about this moment in time?
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Christiane Amanpour
I think confusion, some disappointment, and a lot of questions about is this the new normal, or are we going to go back to some sort of relationship that is more familiar? I'm also hearing that people are not assuming that, and they're already thinking about what comes next, which is not good for the United States in that what comes next in terms of how arrangements are made, how trade relationships happen.
- [23:16]
Interviewer/Host
That might cut out the United States.
- [23:17]
Christiane Amanpour
Yes.
- [23:18]
Interviewer/Host
Might be forced to cut out the United States.
- [23:19]
Christiane Amanpour
Yes. And I think that is a concern. You know, the United States has benefited from. Donald Trump has the idea that somehow the United States has been terribly disadvantaged by its relationships in the world and that the world is sponging off of the US but it's been a mutually beneficial relationship. And you Know, just think about the dollar, you know, as the sort of default currency of the world and all the other benefits that have accrued to the United States because there was trust in the United States.
- [23:54]
Interviewer/Host
So to one of their questions, there may be an answer. I'm just going to posit it out there. Of course, things can change from second to second, but are we going to go back to more of a normal relationship? Already Donald Trump has seen the markets. He has already said, I have no intention of firing Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Fed, because of what all his previous words did to the markets. Then he said, I'm not going to play hardball with China. And the 145% tariff, obviously is not going to stay, but they need to make a good deal. And Scott Besant, who's going to be talking, has said a trade war with China is unsustainable. So that many people are describing as a blink and at the very least a U turn. Did you have to deal with those things? I'm not talking about in that sort of situation, but, you know, dealing with people's fears, I mean. Yes, yeah.
- [24:43]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, you know, I was always very sensitive when I was talking to you and others when I was working for President Obama to the fact that my words could have tangible impacts around the world, because people would interpret that I was speaking for the President of the United States. And certainly his words could have those implications. And Donald Trump doesn't have those same fears. I mean, he. It goes directly from his head to the world without an editorial.
- [25:15]
Interviewer/Host
No, it goes from his gut. He says it.
- [25:17]
Christiane Amanpour
Yes, yes, okay. But he is an intuitive, improvisational person and has been throughout his life, and that has served him well. But as he's learned, particularly in this tariff discussion, when you improvise, you can create enormous lurches in the markets that can have really tangible and destructive impacts.
- [25:41]
Interviewer/Host
I mean, already have trillions of dollars have been lost off of American, you know, capitalization and all the rest of it. And obviously, Xi has not blinked and he's just standing firm. So I want to get to this issue in terms of American reaction. Donald Trump's poll ratings are coming down, but by no mean are they collapsing. And, but on the economy, which is why he was elected mostly, and immigration, they're quite low right now, or lower than they were. He's done no major legislation, you know, since in the 100 days. But in a similar period of time when they also had congressional support, the Biden administration worked with Congress to negotiate major economic bills, infrastructure, environment, high Tech, manufacturing support, sign them into law, child poverty things, all of that kind of stuff. And yet Trump still gets a lot more credit with all of this economic chaos than the Biden administration did for actual economic legislation for working and middle class.
- [26:43]
Christiane Amanpour
Yeah, well, first of all, I think that Biden had the misfortune of having to govern through a pandemic. And so, you know, oftentimes it's what people feel. You can present tangible facts that, you know, here are the things we've done. But there was a pervasive sense throughout the pandemic and after the pandemic that largely driven by inflation, not just in the U.S. but all over the, the world, that things were, it was harder, things were harder, it was harder to get by. We've had, you know, huge housing shortage. That's been an issue there. There were just day to day costs that accrued to people. And the President took the brunt of the blame for that, though. Inflation was a global challenge and the impression was abetted by his, his age and his appearance that he was just being overrun by events.
- [27:43]
Interviewer/Host
You, you've said, I've heard you say that Donald Trump is the best salesman in your, in your memory, in our lifetime.
- [27:50]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, I think in, in, in, you know, one of the best in American political history.
- [27:54]
Interviewer/Host
But does that, is that essentially what, not what it's all about, but a huge percentage of where the success is? Because clearly President Biden was not a great salesman. He was not a good storyteller at all.
- [28:06]
Christiane Amanpour
Yes.
- [28:07]
Interviewer/Host
Nor any of his administration.
- [28:08]
Christiane Amanpour
And look, there was a, there was a lack of energy that, that was palpable and that hurt him. And now here comes Donald Trump. No, he hasn't passed legislation. You know, why do you think he hasn't?
- [28:22]
Interviewer/Host
He has both houses of Congress. Why is all this executive?
- [28:25]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, he has both houses of Congress, but he has a very narrow margin in the House. He's got, you know, the filibuster to deal with in the Senate. And I think their notion was to test the limits of executive authority and do as much by executive order as possible. And that's what he's done. And honestly, there's been a lot of action. You know, think about, you know, someone breaking a billiard, you know, in billiards, breaking the balls. They're going everywhere. And so there's a sense that something's happening. And in a country where people felt events were overrunning us and the President wasn't in control, now comes this guy who's moving a lot of things around. You know, the Test will be at the end of the day, do people feel like their lives are better because of it? Are there costs coming down? Some of the things he's doing are actually driving.
- [29:16]
Interviewer/Host
And they say maybe more inflation.
- [29:17]
Christiane Amanpour
If you see, I mean, one of the reasons I think you see him going after Chairman Powell is I think he's looking for people to blame.
- [29:24]
Interviewer/Host
Yeah, but he switched on that again.
- [29:26]
Christiane Amanpour
He did. Only because the markets.
- [29:27]
Interviewer/Host
Right, but it's always only because of the markets. That's what happened April 9th when he did the 90 day pause.
- [29:32]
Christiane Amanpour
But with Donald Trump, there's always another day. And you know, everyone in politics, everyone in business, every world leader wakes up with some degree of dread as they check to see what he posted that.
- [29:49]
Interviewer/Host
Night here across the Atlantic Ocean. Whether it's in Britain, whether it's Europe, Africa, Asia, wherever you look, people are not just saying, oh, Donald Trump. People are saying America's reputation is shot to an extent. And people are asking, what is it with the American people? What do they stand for? Because I think, you know, we've always been told over here that you are the exceptional nation, that you have brought us peace and prosperity, rules of the road, you know, all that world order that America created for the benefit of pretty much itself and the world. But it's not just the economy, it's the mass deportations, it's the crackdown, academic freedom, it's going off to the media. It's no due process. Who are the American people today? What is the electorate?
- [30:36]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, look, I think the Amer, you.
- [30:38]
Interviewer/Host
Know, they voted for this.
- [30:41]
Christiane Amanpour
I mentioned this when we've been together before. I'm the son of a refugee and I'm very grateful to our country and very proud of our country for all the reasons you mentioned. And one of the things that concerns me is that the things that make America exceptional are the fact that we are a beacon to people around the world, strivers from all over the world who feel come and strengthened our country. You know, research scientists and others who have made us the technological and scientific hub of the world. The rule of law, you know, all of these things are. And all of them are under assault here. And that is disquieting to me and I think to many Americans. The thing is that people first judge through the prism of their own life experience. And a lot of Americans have been alienated about how their path has moved along even in the times of great prosperity. And there's a frustration, there's a frustration with government. Christiane, we did a. I am the founder of the Institute of Politics at the University of Chicago. We did a poll there a couple of years ago as part of a conference we did on disinformation. And we gave people sort of agree disagree statements as part of that poll. And one of them was a government is corrupt and rigged against people like me. 56% of Americans said, yes, I agree with that. That is a warning sign. And frankly, to Democrats, my fellow Democrats, I would say that's something to pay attention to. If you're the party who believes that government is a tool for progress, then you ought to be concerned about that and ask yourself and investigate why do people feel that way?
- [32:30]
Interviewer/Host
Okay, so concerned about that. Yes. But also concerned about how an opposition actually is an opposition. The Democrats are now in the opposition, but they are viewed as being, you know, pretty much shell shocked and unable to have any kind of coordinated.
- [32:44]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, we've never actually seen what we've seen in the last 90 days. I mean, Donald Trump has basically, through the use of executive orders and actions, has started a bunch of. He's lit a bunch of trees on fire. Democrats have had a hard time knowing where the hose were.
- [33:02]
Interviewer/Host
Correct. And we're going to get to that because to be fair, he telegraphed it loud and clear. Project 2025, which he denied, but which was there for everybody to read, told us exactly where this was going. Of course, even those of us who are observers are amazed by the speed and the, and the.
- [33:17]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, it's unprecedented.
- [33:18]
Interviewer/Host
Unprecedented, that's true. But I want to get to this. For instance, usaid and the cuts on USAID are very harmful. They harm America's soft power and they harm the people overseas who depends on them. You told Democrats to quit whining about that issue and stop fighting on that issue. But I want to ask you this, because there seems to be a dispute between Democrats important arms of the Democratic Party. Governor Newsom saying, you know, trying to talk to all the far right people on his podcast and saying this and that. You've got AOC and Bernie Sanders out because Democrats are apparently furious at their leaders and want a populist revolt. And you said this thing. So what is the strategy for a united response?
- [34:01]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, first of all, let me just say one thing. I believe that the dis. The dismantlement of American foreign aid will turn out to be one of the worst foreign policy decisions certainly of my lifetime, maybe of the entire history of the country. Because for a very small investment, which is 1% or less of the federal budget, you know, you have enormous impact in terms of preventing disease and terrorism and so many things that ultimately affect Americans. Forget about the humanitarian aspects of it, which I value very much, but and the goodwill that you squander. There are tangible impacts of this that will be felt downstream. But you know, most Americans believe that 30% of the budget goes to foreign aid. And so the question is, where do you, where do you make the fight? You certainly should resist this and fight it where you can in the Congress, in the courts and so on. But in terms of communications, what is it? What is the story you're trying to tell us?
- [35:04]
Interviewer/Host
We want to ask you because you are the president maker. I was hoping you would, Anthony, if the next presidential candidate on your party, what do you tell them to do? Let's say they've declared themselves.
- [35:14]
Christiane Amanpour
I think that the party of working people ought to think deeply about working people and what it is that people are so, are struggling with in their lives. And you know what it is, Too often Democrats approach voters with a notion that we know what's best for you and we're here to help you become more like us and more successful and so on the sort of college educated metropolitan Democratic Party. And it is a message that's, I think, taken as disdainful. The big thing to think about is what big structural changes do we have to make to make good on an American dream that a lot of Americans don't believe is real anymore? And I think that's the fundamental task of the Democratic Party. Secondly, let me just make this one point. Donald Trump is here. He's not going to be here forever. No matter what he thinks, he's not going to be here forever, but there's going to be a big blast radius from what he's done. And a lot of things will be torn down that are very important and a lot of things will be torn down that needed to be reformed. And the question, I think for the Democratic Party is what are you going to build in its place? Are you going to simply restore what was there even though people didn't feel they were being well served by a lot of what was there? Or are you going to build something new that's more resistant to corruption, that's more responsive to everyday people, that is more agile and uses the tools of the 21st century? That, I think is what Democrats ought to be thinking about. Instead of being on their back foot, be on the front foot and think about what the future is. That, that, that the, that we, that, that we can build as a country after the hurricane.
- [37:07]
Interviewer/Host
Well, that's interesting. After the hurricane, I want to ask you this. A lot of people say it's gonna be up to the Republicans. In fact, Republicans in Senate, maybe business people, and in the very powerful right wing conservative media sphere, which is podcasts and all these, you know, right wing things. So to that point, Joe Rogan, he has started talking about some of these issues, particularly the mass deportation. We're going to play this sound bite.
- [37:34]
Christiane Amanpour
The problem with things that are going in a radical direction, and then there's an overcorrection. So the overcorrection is lack of due process. The overcorrection is like round them all up, ship them to jail.
- [37:46]
Interviewer/Host
That's dangerous, Joe. That's dangerous.
- [37:48]
Christiane Amanpour
That's dangerous. That's dangerous. That's. We got to be careful that we don't become monsters while we're fighting monsters.
- [37:55]
Interviewer/Host
How important is it not you, the politicians or the strategists or the experts or the academics, but a Joe Rogan who maybe helped make Trump president, is now saying this, is this the game changer?
- [38:09]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, look, I think that what generally reigns in excesses by leaders is their own party. When their own party begins to drift away is when leaders react or become greatly weakened. Right now, Republicans are very much supportive of Trump. I don't know whether this Rogan piece will influence now, younger voters have drifted away in polling. Younger voters, who in greater numbers than for past Republican candidates, supported Trump. He still lost, but by a much smaller margin. So, yeah, I think that it is significant. And I was interested in what Rogin said, because whenever I speak to audiences where there are a lot of Trump voters, I said, you know, you love Donald Trump. I understand that, but he's not going to be president forever. And do you want the next, say the next president, just for discussion purposes, is aoc, do you want her to have to exercise the same kind of powers where she can sweep up people without due process, where she can make executive orders that sweep Congress aside? Do you want that? And what Rogan is saying is, you know, we may like what we see now and make disappearing people to El Salvador, but are we going to like it when another president is doing it and maybe doing it to us?
- [39:37]
Interviewer/Host
David Axelrod, thank you very much. And I'm not going to make a big deal about it, but I think you just endorsed AOC for, for the next Democratic. No, I didn't.
- [39:43]
Christiane Amanpour
No, I did not. I did not.
- [39:47]
Interviewer/Host
Thank you very much.
- [39:48]
Christiane Amanpour
Good to be with you.
- [39:50]
Interviewer/Host
And we'll be back right after this short break. Welcome back. As the world Mourns the loss of Pope Francis. A deep sense of sorrow is felt in the Holy Family Catholic Church in Gaza City, a community the pontiff spoke with every day over 18 months of this war. For the Christian Palestinians who take refuge there, his calls were a ray of hope and a reminder that they hadn't been forgotten. And Jeremy diamond has our report. Yusuf.
- [40:27]
Jeremy Diamond
For the last 18 months of his life, this was Pope Francis nightly ritual. At 8pm a call to war torn Gaza. From the third day of the war until two days before his death, Pope Francis spoke nightly with the Holy Family.
- [40:52]
Christiane Amanpour
Church.
- [40:55]
Jeremy Diamond
Forging a special wartime bond that priests and parishioners of Gaza's only Catholic church won't ever forget.
- [41:02]
Interviewer/Host
Daily he called us to ask for peace, to pray for peace and to give the blessing for all Gazan people and for all the Palestinians.
- [41:16]
Jeremy Diamond
He spoke to us with a father's anxiety for his children, church leader George Anton recalled. He would reassure us, checking if we had eaten, if we had something to drink, if we had medicine, how the children were feeling, how the mothers were coping. The relationship drew the pope closer to the plight of Gaza's civilian population and informed his outspoken criticism of Israel's attacks. Yesterday children were bombed, the pope decried in December. This is cruelty. This is not war. I want to say this because it touched my heart. The pope also regularly called out rising anti Semitism and demanded the release of Israeli hostages, including in his final address on Easter Sunday in which he called for a ceasefire. One last time inside Gaza's Holy Family Church, one of the many communities Pope Francis touched gathers to pray for his soul and for the world, to see them as Francis did. My message to the world is to look at Gaza with the same eyes through which Pope Francis viewed it, eyes of truth, justice, peace, love. Eyes that saw the people of Gaza as deserving of life with dignity, justice and independence. From this small church in Gaza, a prayer against the scourge of indifference, which Pope Francis called the greatest sickness of our time. Jeremy Dimon, cnn, Jerusalem.
- [42:52]
Interviewer/Host
Now on the bigger and broader issue, the fight between the Trump administration and higher education in America is escalating. This week, Harvard University filed a lawsuit against the administration for freezing $2 billion in their federal funds, accusing the government of trying to, quote, gain control of academic academic decision making at Harvard. But it's far from collective action. In Florida, a very different approach is develop, with several colleges and universities signing agreements with ICE to carry out immigration enforcement on campuses. The administration justifies much of this as cracking down on anti Semitism on campus. In the wake of major protests last year over the war in Gaza. But for some Jews, it is increasingly looking like a dangerous weaponization of antisemitism. Sharon Brous is a prominent rabbi in Los Angeles, and last year, she visited some protests herself, and now she's warning that these campus crackdowns, detentions, and deportations are, quote, not going to protect Jews. We're being used. Welcome to our program. Rabbi Brauss, welcome back to the program. You're in California. Can I just start by asking you just to comment on what you heard from our correspondent and also from Pope Francis, who regularly talked about the hostages who are still there, the civilians who are being attacked, and basically said also that to be anti Semitic is to be anti Christian.
- [44:21]
Rabbi Sharon Brous
That's right.
- [44:21]
Interviewer/Host
Yeah.
- [44:22]
Rabbi Sharon Brous
Right. I mean, first of all, this is. This is such a loss, and may his memory always be a blessing. This pope was a model for us of what it means to be a faith leader and a moral leader who cared deeply for human suffering. He cared deeply about human beings, and he said frequently that the dream of peace is a dream for both Palestinians and Israelis. He called, as you said, for the return of the hostages. There's still 24, God willing, living hostages, 59 hostages still held in Gaza, and there's catastrophic loss and suffering among the Palestinian population in Gaza every day. And this is a pope who cared so deeply, and that was what drove, I believe, his desire to see this war end. He believed that there was a different kind of future possible for Israelis and Palestinians. And I only hope and pray that more people could hear his voice and his plea.
- [45:15]
Interviewer/Host
Mm. Let's just broaden it out as we. As we just sort of suggested, particularly because I was interested by some of your sermons to your congregation and some of the things you've written and said about the current showdown between the Trump administration and higher education universities. So I sort of laid it out a little bit. We know what's going on at Harvard. There's a big battle going on there. We know that other universities, like Columbia essentially didn't fight back. And we see these students who, yes, were at protest being essentially taken away and detained without due process and no charges filed. I'm interested with how you are feeling about this. And also there is a division between, you know, within America's Jewish community over the efficacy of this.
- [46:05]
Rabbi Sharon Brous
Right, right. I mean, I think you laid it out really well. There is an antisemitism problem. We're seeing right now a surge of anti Semitism, a lot of it on the campuses. We saw a year and a half of humiliation, harassment, bullying, threats, and some calls to violence on some of the campuses. Not all of the campuses and not all of the protests are driven by anti Semitism. Some of them are also driven by a genuine and sincere desire to see an end to a terrible and as I said, catastrophic war. But the universities, many of them, failed to address the needs of Jewish students to feel safe on campus and to create environments that were conducive to learning for everybody. And the administration stepped right into that void and that vacuum. And these are very draconian actions that are not intended to keep Jewish students safe. But they're using Jewish lack of safety as a pretext to enter into this space. And I believe it's very clear. Pursue anti democratic measures, including attacks on higher education, the dismantling of democratic institutions, a rollback on civil rights, and other elements that will be very dangerous, not only for Jewish students, but really for all of us, first and foremost, for the Palestinian students that are now being detained and may be deported, but also for all of us. Timothy Snyder has said so clearly, when universities are attacked, it's never in the best interest of the Jews. So the fact that they're claiming that this is to support my kids and my community is just. It's just false. And we're being asked now to make a false choice between Jewish safety on one hand and protection of our democracy on the other hand. And we just can't be forced into that kind of decision. There's no reason to be. We can be safe and we can support and sustain a really thriving democracy right now. And these actions are going to endanger both of those goals.
- [48:18]
Interviewer/Host
You know, I still find it really interesting that there is a division amongst the US Jewish community. I'm just going to play a little bit. Sorry. From Jonathan Greenblatt, who's the head of adl, who pretty much largely supported the deportation of Mahmoud Khalil. But you're also saying that, you know, overreach potentially is happening in the government's approach to Harvard. This is what he told CNN last night.
- [48:44]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, look at the adl. It's our job to protect the Jewish people. We're not sort of public defenders for some of the Hamas.
- [48:57]
Interviewer/Host
Okay, well, that's. That didn't go as far as I thought it was going to be. But he was saying we're not defenders of everybody. I think he was saying Hamas snakes. I really need to say that if you take Mahmoud Khalil, who's one of the ringleaders at Colombia, based on his Conduct. We thought he was a very problematic individual. You know, there's been no charges filed. I mean, surely the evidence is right there. The proof is in that fact. And the pictures of the young woman, the Turkish student, who was lifted from Tufts by basically plain clothes ICE agents and unmarked cars, I think shocked a lot of people. But I guess I'm trying to ask you because there are certain Jewish groups in the US who have a database and are essentially allowing the government. Groups like Canary Mission and Beta usa, they're pro Israel organizations. They've been assembling a database of students and scholars who criticize Israel. And now they say that the White House is using their blacklist. Where is this going to end?
- [50:00]
Rabbi Sharon Brous
I don't know where this is going to end. I mean, I can tell you the historians warn us that this is exactly. These are the foundational steps toward tyranny, toward totalitarianism, which obviously will render all of us in this country and around the world less safe. Without speaking specifically to the individual cases of the students that so far have been detained. And we know of several of them so far. As you said, we have heard of no criminal charges that have been leveled against these students. There might be information that we don't yet know. But one of them in particular, who was detained the other day from Colombia, has been lifted up as a peace builder. Somebody who's been meeting for the last four months, a Palestinian from the west bank with Israeli students at Columbia University, trying to put forward a vision of what peace could look like. So this just rings of authoritarianism and strikes me as incredibly dangerous. And you've lifted up some of the very right wing organizations in the United States. But I want to share that many of the mainstream Jewish organizations have spoken out very clearly and unequivocally against this. We have a very strong niemoller. First they came for the socialists memory that's built in. And we understand that when plainclothes officers approach a student on her way to Iftar at Tufts and grab her and throw her in a van, that that does not bode well for democracy. And that leaves not only that student, but all of us less safe. And that's something we're quite concerned about.
- [51:33]
Interviewer/Host
Yeah. And of course, you have, as I said, been to some of the protests and you had problems, as you told us on our air, with some of what was going on, as you enumerated, you know, just before. Um, but the question is, you see, where there's. There doesn't seem. There seems to be sort of double standards you know, Ben gvir, who is the extreme right wing minister of police in Israel, has been invited to speak at Yale and he was scheduled to attend sort of off campus events. And we don't know what's going on, but he's been, you know, this is a guy who's actually been convicted of incitement to racism, supporting a terrorist organization, you know, and joining him is an extremist settler who's convicted of national security offenses, assaulting an elderly Palestinian. And they were all, a lot of them were sanctioned under the Biden administration, but those sanctions have been lifted. You know, this kind of thing, do you think it puts it sets up a dangerous double standard that then people don't take any of it seriously?
- [52:33]
Rabbi Sharon Brous
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, this is one of the great dangers of exploiting anti Semitism and legitimate Jewish trauma and fear and concern for our safety in order to advance anti democratic measures. If everything is anti Semitic, then nothing is actually anti Semitic. We can't actually address the real problems if we argue that everything is a problem. Standing in solidarity with Palestinians and expressing tremendous grief over Palestinian suffering does not render a person antisemitic. Antisemitism is real and antisemitism, it poses great threat not only to Jews, but to our democracy and our whole society. And we cannot address it if we treat everyone everywhere like they're an anti Semite. And so this is extremely dangerous for us. And this is why most American Jews really oppose what's happening right now. They also, by the way, really strongly oppose Ben GVIR Smotrich and the hardline ultra nationalist government that's now ruling Israel. There was great opposition to Ben GVIR being invited to speak in the United States at all. And so this is not normal what's happening now. And we have to continue to use our voices to cry out against the normalization of something that should not ever be treated as normal.
- [53:53]
Interviewer/Host
Incredibly important distinctions that you're making there. Thank you as ever, Rabbi Sharon Brous. Thank you. And that is it for us. Thanks for watching and goodbye from London.
- [54:05]
Christiane Amanpour
News fatigue.
- [54:06]
Interviewer/Host
Have I got news for you.
- [54:07]
Christiane Amanpour
As the cure and also the disease.
- [54:10]
Interviewer/Host
CNN's Comedy Quiz show is back. Making sense of the mayhem and definitely adding to it. Have I got news for you. Return Saturday, September 6th on CNN.