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- [00:04]
Bianna Golodriga
Hello, everyone, and welcome to Amanpour. Here's what's coming up.
- [00:09]
President Zelenskyy
Our people are dying, too. That is why we are doing everything to stop this war and to guarantee security.
- [00:17]
Bianna Golodriga
As delegates head to Geneva for the next round of Ukraine peace talks, Christian discusses what's at stake in Munich with President Zelensky and leaders from NATO, Europe and the United States. Then in Venezuela, celebrations as some political prisoners are released, while many more remain behind bars. I ask one of them, leading opposition activist Jesus Armas, if he believes Venezuela is on a path to democracy.
- [00:46]
Michelle Martin
And it's a drug that can be misused and it's a drug with potential therapeutic consequences. But that doesn't mean it's all good or all bad.
- [00:53]
Bianna Golodriga
With marijuana legalized in state after state today, Michelle Martin speaks to neurobiologist Margaret Haney about how the drug affects the brain. Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Bianna Golodriga in New York, sitting in for Christiane Amanpour. It's been almost four years since Russia's brutal full scale invasion of Ukraine began. And now Ukrainian negotiators are headed to Geneva to meet with Russia and the United States for the next round of talks, hoping to hammer out a cease fire agreement. Secretary of State Marco Rubio says President Trump wants a solution that ends the bloodshed once and for all. And President Trump says Kyiv has to move because Russia wants to make a deal. Speaking. Speaking at the Munich security Conference, President Zelenskyy told delegates that Ukraine will do everything to make these negotiations successful.
- [02:00]
President Zelenskyy
The Americans often return to the topic of concessions. And too often those concessions are discussed in the context only of Ukraine, not Russia. This is very important. And Ukraine keeps returning to one simple point. Peace can only be built on clear, clear security guarantees. Where there is no clear security system, war always returns.
- [02:29]
Bianna Golodriga
And there's still no end to the war in sight as tens of thousands of soldiers on both sides are killed each month and Ukrainians huddle in the cold, their energy system decimated by Russian bombardment. In Munich, Christian sat down with Zelenskyy alongside NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, European partners, Parliament President Roberta Metsola and U.S. republican Senator Roger Wicker. Here's their conversation.
- [02:55]
Christiane Amanpour
Can I just ask you, what do you need right now? I'm really conscious of the time and owning time issue that you've talked about, but if you were to put out a wish list or a shopping list right now, is it mostly anti aircraft and anti, you know, missiles to protect your skies? What do you need right now?
- [03:16]
President Zelenskyy
So thank you very much for this conversation let's look at priorities. All our challenges are first energy challenge. We need missiles for Patriot systems first of all for Patriots. And so we spoke yesterday with our Norway partners, Americans and also with Germany. So we need also missiles for NASAMs and for IRST systems. This is crucial. This is number one what we need missiles and as quick as possible. I'm very thankful for possibility Mark for you and thanks you and for. And not only Pearl. We're thankful for Ramstein. I think that it was positive. I will tell you successful when missiles will come to Ukraine. Yeah. So I hope that it will be successful. And it was very difficult and Germany helped very much. And Minister Pistorius, I don't know where is he. I think he works. Yes. On this plan. Hope so. Yeah. To bring more missiles to us. So this is about energy. We spoke yesterday with our Berlins group how we call it because we had successful meeting yesterday with all the partners. And I think the idea before 24 to strengthen Ukraine as much as possible with energy supplies will be a plan of energy support, plan of missiles. The this is important. Then it's Pearl Marcus sitting here now. Then I see Roberta. So we need membership in eu. You said. You said which list and then membership in NATO.
- [04:57]
Christiane Amanpour
I ain't. All right, let me ask.
- [05:00]
President Zelenskyy
And we need security guarantees which been.
- [05:04]
Christiane Amanpour
Voted in a second Secretary General President Zelensky and the Ukrainian people. And as he said Europe expect right now for the defense of that land and your land. What can they get right now?
- [05:17]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
Can I before I answer the question, just share with you two things. I saw myself last week in Kyiv. It was a small team of colleagues from NATO. First of all, I saw you saw one of the pictures here of the impact of five missiles taking out one of these huge heating plants. And we do not always realize in this part of Europe that when it comes to to Kiev and the big cities they are heated centrally. So what the Russians did was five missiles take out this heating plant responsible for heating the homes of a quarter of a million people. That plants will be down at least for two months. That means that these people. And it was minus 25 degrees last week in Kiev during night and minus 15 degrees during day. That they are living in those conditions. When you speak with the people they are telling me hey, keep on supporting us. We will not give in. It only makes them almost stronger. Despite the terrible difficulty they are facing. We have to realize the Russians are not winning this. As you said, they lost 65,000 people in December and in January. They are not winning this. They make very small gains in Donetsk and other places, so small that it's almost not relevant, but they lose all these people. If there is a dictator in Moscow willing to do that, we are really working with somebody who is willing to do that to get so many of his own people killed in that war. We have to take that seriously, because this is crazy behavior at every level. So what we need to do here in this room, in all our positions, the politicians and everybody who can influence this, is to make sure that these people who are staunch, who are defending themselves, who will never give up, that they have the offensive stuff they need, we need to do this, keep them strong in the fight. They will do it, but they need our support.
- [07:06]
Christiane Amanpour
And the second part of that, the other side of that coin, is putting enough pain on Putin, as you have said and as others have said, to actually get serious about a serious negotiation.
- [07:17]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
And that's exactly what Rubio said today. Right? It is testing him. Is he serious, Putin, about all of this? And he is again sending this historian next week to, to the talks in Geneva. So he will again lecture the Ukrainians about how to rush from Sweden or whatever.
- [07:29]
Christiane Amanpour
But in his speech, in his speech, he mentioned Ukraine only in passing, and the words were elusive.
- [07:36]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
Peace.
- [07:36]
Christiane Amanpour
So we'll get to that in a minute. Roberto Metsola for Europe. You saw a call to arms today from Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, from Prime Minister Starmer, really rebuilding Europe's military industrial complex. What, though can you do now? How come you haven't managed to get all those, you know, the money of Russia that you could actually give to Ukraine, and most of the Europeans agree with it. Why can't you just get it done and put pressure on Putin, as President Zelensky says? And as it's patently clear that there is not enough pressure on Putin yet, he doesn't feel enough pain on that.
- [08:13]
Roberta Metsola
We agree. Next week I will sign a 90 billion euro loan to Ukraine agreed in under four weeks in an unprecedented speed. You might say it took us too long. We used to do things much slower before, but when push came to shove, we really put our money where our mouth is. And this is what we need to use as the strongest of message, that when I first came to Ukraine a couple of weeks into the beginning of the war, Volodymyr, I told you that we would stand with you. And I preside over a parliament where the majorities are huge. And I want to say this because every second question, wherever we go, we're asked, but there's fatigue and people are looking away and you're losing your priorities on what you should do. My answer is I was in the opening of the Winter Olympics one week ago and the loudest cheers was for the Ukrainian delegation. And that is what shows spontaneously that the people of Europe are with you. What have we done since 24th February 2022? So we have the immense increase in GDP expenditure on defence. That's also thanks to your leadership, Mark. Secondly, we have adopted an unprecedented number of sanctions in terms of packages. We're waiting for the 20 package now. We are working and agreed with Volodymyr when he talked about the next step on what we should do on the shadow fleet. We have two new members in NATO. And this is particularly personal for me because one of my sons is serving in the military of one of them. And that is what would never have been done if it were not for Ukrainians fighting for the freedom that we took for granted, that we looked away, that we took too long to respond to.
- [10:03]
Christiane Amanpour
Okay, Senator Wicker, senior Senator, Republican Senator, what more can the United States do? We've had a year of so called negotiations in which every time we look around it appears that President Trump puts more pressure on President Zelenskyy than on President Putin. There is a package of sanctions that's ready to go. I understand both houses of Congress.
- [10:27]
Senator Roger Wicker
That's right. And that's the good news. And what we've just heard from Europe is very good news. What we need specifically is we need for the administration to unleash the Tomahawk missiles. And that's a message that will come from the Congress. It's the decision of the administration. But the very good news, in addition to the good news about messages of reassurance today and the support that this room has shown, we will be able to vote in two weeks time on sanctions. And what Ukraine really needs is for Russia to run out of oil. And if we pass meaningful, serious sanctions on the oil producers on say the eight refineries around the world that Russia does depends on, that can bring a meaningful, a meaningful change in the negotiations. Some other good news, Public opinion in favor of Ukraine in the United States is growing. Public opinion among Republicans being polled is growing in the United States. And we're in a position with the sanctions bill perhaps next week for this to be a turning point.
- [11:54]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, that is very interesting news for sure. President Zelensky, we were talking about security guarantees, all the things that you need in order to actually sign on to a peace process. I don't know what you make of President Trump's latest, in which I believe yesterday he said Zelensky is going to have to get moving. Russia wants to make a deal and Zelensky is going to have to get moving, otherwise he's going to miss a great opportunity. He has to move. Are you. Obviously. I mean, this is pressure. Are you feeling the pressure?
- [12:29]
President Zelenskyy
A little bit. I mean, that's. I understand. Signals of the President. Maybe it's preparing atmosphere before Switzerland meeting, trilateral meeting and etc. So not losing our dignity. We can move. We made a lot of compromises speaking with Russians beginning even with this, we have trilateral meetings with all respect to the United States. They proposed us to have such meetings. I think it was a compromise from the side of Ukrainian people. The second point is we are ready to speak and continue. We are ready to speak about constant line. We are ready to speak about the stop on the contact line and then begin to talk. This is also compromise because we are speaking about our territories which are temporary occupied, our people which have been killed. So a lot of different compromises. The question is what Russians are ready to do. We don't hear compromises from Russian side. We want to hear from them. Something and I think this is important.
- [13:43]
Christiane Amanpour
Before you carry on, can I just ask you about two press.
- [13:46]
President Zelenskyy
Our people under pressure, by the way, about the pressure. Our people, Ukrainians under pressure.
- [13:50]
Christiane Amanpour
They're being killed. The FT reports that you are prepared to announce a plan for presidential elections and a referendum on a peace deal. That you're prepared to announce that even potentially by the end of this month. True or false?
- [14:04]
President Zelenskyy
Something new for me. So you don't know it was new for me? Yes, I think I answered already on this question. But I can repeat. First of all, of course, nobody support elections during the war. It's something strange. I said it about so many times. Then I said, if American side will push this signal, I'm ready to show that we are ready for this. Okay, give us. I'm very honest. Give us two months of ceasefire. We will go to elections. That's it. Give us ceasefire. Give us security infrastructure. Maybe not two months, but we need a lot of days to prepare. Then give us possibility, our soldiers to vote. How they can, I mean, defend our lives, our country and at the same moment to vote. This is something difficult. Even not. I mean, this strange. It's something very difficult and I don't know who has such experience. We don't have it and we can't compare. Sometimes I heard. Sorry. Sometimes I heard yes, we had elections in the United States during Lincoln's time and etc. How we can compare it? We have missiles, our people under missiles. It's not just land war, a lot of missiles. We're under ballistic attacks. So give us ceasefire. President Trump can do it, push Putin, make ceasefire, then our parliament will change the law and we will go to elections if they need them. If Americans need elections in Ukraine and if Russians need elections in Ukraine, we.
- [15:43]
Christiane Amanpour
Are open for this, Secretary General, but.
- [15:47]
President Zelenskyy
We can also give ceasefire for Russians if they will do elections in Russia.
- [16:13]
Christiane Amanpour
Secretary General, even the Chinese, this is why he is. But that's his previous and his current.
- [16:18]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
Never give him strength.
- [16:19]
Christiane Amanpour
Right. Communication. Can I ask you, even the Chinese foreign minister, as he was talking and addressing today, did the whole Russian trope about having to talk about the historical reasons and the preconditions and this and that for a ceasefire, what do you see as the vital security guarantees that need to be in place? And so far, Russia has said no to even an international monitoring force of Europeans. So what do you see is a realistic security guarantee?
- [16:51]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
We need security guarantees at three levels. Level one is the Ukrainian armed forces. They have to be so strong and so well trained, and of course, they are already battle hardened that they can first of all, of course, defend themselves. Then we need, and this is the leadership of Macron and Starmer within Europe, the coalition of the willingness. Many other countries participating in Europe, Canada, and also, by the way, more and more the US Getting involved. We will come to that. But the coalition of the willing nations in NATO, but also outside NATO working. And then the third element is the Americans. It was a crucial moment when the American President Trump said in August, I want to be part of that. I want to be participating. And then we articulated the Ukrainians and the Americans and the coalition of the willing, what that will be. And this is exactly as the President said, as Volodymyr said in January, we had a meeting in Paris, very successful, with the Americans, where I would say 95, 96, 97% of the security guarantees now done. So this is crucial because that means that when that peace deal is there, we can make sure collectively with the Ukrainian armed forces, the first line of defense, that the Russians will not attack again. But obviously to do that, you need Putin to play ball. What I am seeing what the Americans are doing consistently since February under President Trump's leadership, Marco Rubio, Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, is they are testing the Russians to see whether they are serious.
- [18:12]
Christiane Amanpour
Yeah, but this has been going on for a year. But hey, how much testing?
- [18:15]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
We can have as much criticism as you want on the present American government, but I am going to defend them there.
- [18:21]
Christiane Amanpour
No, I see the question.
- [18:21]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
I know, I know. No, no, no. But in the question, I hear some of this.
- [18:26]
Christiane Amanpour
How long do you think this has been the deadliest year for Ukraine?
- [18:30]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
But here's the thing. Here's the thing. If we agree that only the American President was able to break the deathlock with Putin, I think it was only him because he is the leader of the mightiest nation on earth, a quarter of the world economy, the mightiest military on earth. He did that in February. He broke the deadlock and never. No one expected this to end soon. It is an extremely difficult situation we are dealing with. And the most important issue here is not Zelensky or the Ukrainian team. They are willing to play ball. They want this to end as soon as possible. Nobody wants to prolong this. So it is the Russians who have to play ball.
- [19:03]
Christiane Amanpour
Senator Wicker, as far as I gather, and you can confirm that Secretary of State Marco Rubio did not choose to go to the special Berlin format meeting of all the President Zelenskyy, Mark Rutte and the other leaders. What do you think that signals and do you think, as Secretary General Rutte says, that the United States is absolutely committed to. To a fair and just peace and is willing to do the work for it? When I say the United States, I mean this administration.
- [19:34]
Senator Roger Wicker
I take the Secretary of State's statement at face value. I don't think it matters very much. But let me say this. Vladimir Putin has not yet negotiated in good faith. Never once Vladimir Putin started this war. He's a war criminal. And as you've pointed out, he started committing more war crimes this year by attacking civilians. He will begin to negotiate in good faith only when he is hurting enough. And that's what these oil sanctions may do.
- [20:11]
Christiane Amanpour
Last word to you, Mr. President. How do you think this year is going to go? Let's take the next six months.
- [20:16]
President Zelenskyy
Let's think about tomorrow. Tomorrow really, and the day after tomorrow, how it will be. We will support peace dialogue. If United States will stay, I hope will stay in negotiation panels and dialogues. It's important for us, I hope, that we will involve more and we will work on it, more European colleagues. Then I really hope that we will have support from the United States, from administration and Congress on security guarantees. We need their votings. I hope that we will have security guarantees. Very, very clear for. Sorry, but first of all, for our people. That our people will know what will be. If Russia will come again, then we really want to work on EU membership. And I know that some European leaders are not happy with my rhetoric and messages. I'm sorry, but I will continue because we need. We are very thankful. It's true, we are very thankful. But we can't save. Only by saying thank you can't save our lives. That's why I'm very honest. For us, it's very important to have a date for our membership. Otherwise after this war will end. I'm sure that it will end. Putin will do everything. Doesn't matter what he will negotiate. He will do everything by his hands or by hands of some not big countries, but very ambitious leaders. He will do everything by using them to block our EU membership. That's why I want very much to have signing by Americans, Russians, Europeans and Ukrainians in these 20 points where the date is written. What can I say? The unity is very important and the United States is important. They have only to make Ukraine stronger than Russia. Okay, thank you.
- [22:24]
Christiane Amanpour
On that note, Mr. President, Secretary General, President of the Parliament, Senator Rickard, thank you so much.
- [22:33]
Bianna Golodriga
Really fascinating conversation. Do stay with cnn. We'll be right back after the.
- [22:43]
President Zelenskyy
My day kicks off with a refreshing Celsius energy drink. Then straight to the gym, pre K pickup back home to meal prep time for my fire station shift. One more Celsius. Gotta keep the lights on when the three alarm hits. I'm ready. Celsius Live fit. Go grab a cold refreshing Celsius at your local retailer or locate now@celsius.com.
- [23:06]
Michelle Martin
This week on the assignment with me, Audie.
- [23:08]
Bianna Golodriga
Cornish, we are going to talk about.
- [23:10]
Michelle Martin
Bad Bunny with somebody who has been.
- [23:12]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
Covering him since the beginning, writer and.
- [23:15]
Michelle Martin
Journalist Susie Exposito, to see the working class being represented.
- [23:21]
Bianna Golodriga
I loved the ways that he brought it to the stadium.
- [23:25]
Michelle Martin
It was like a movie set. It was like a living organism that.
- [23:29]
Bianna Golodriga
We'Re watching on the screen.
- [23:31]
Michelle Martin
It was. That's a great way to put it.
- [23:34]
Bianna Golodriga
Listen to the assignment with me, Audie Cornish.
- [23:36]
Michelle Martin
Streaming now on your favorite podcast, Apple.
- [23:45]
Bianna Golodriga
Well, since the US Grabbed Nicolas Maduro, there have been mixed messages out of Venezuela on restoring democracy. On one hand, acting President Delse Rodriguez defends Maduro's legitimacy. Here's what she said in an interview with NBC News.
- [24:00]
Michelle Martin
So yes, I can tell you that.
- [24:02]
Bianna Golodriga
President Nicolas Maduro is the legitimate president. They are both President Maduro and Celia.
- [24:09]
Michelle Martin
Flores, the first lady, are both innocent.
- [24:12]
Bianna Golodriga
On the other, she touts Venezuela's cooperation with the U.S. speaking here on a visit to oil facilities with the American Energy Secretary. We're doing extraordinary work as partners to improve production facilities, infrastructure and maintenance.
- [24:28]
Michelle Martin
This is the path of cooperation and.
- [24:30]
Bianna Golodriga
The agenda for a long term productive partnership. No obstacle should stand in the way of this productive path that we are on. Rodriguez is also sending mixed messages on human rights. She's overseen the release of dozens of political prisoners while many more remain behind bars. Among those released is Jesus Armas, who led what most observers called a winning presidential campaign for Edmundo Gonzalez. Following that, Armas was held in jail for over a year. I spoke to him about what he endured in prison and his hopes for democracy in Venezuela. Hey, so, Sasothamus, thank you so much for taking the time to join us. Let's go back to 14 months ago when you were abducted at gunpoint, suffocated with a plastic bag over your head, and not knowing if you would live to see another day, a week, a month, and really enduring so, so much torture. Can you just give us a sense of what that says about the Venezuelan state under Nicolas Maduro and his number two, Delsey Rodriguez at the time?
- [25:38]
Jesus Armas
So, without any doubt, in Venezuela, we live under an authoritarian regime. And not only authoritarian in a classical way, it's also a criminal regime that violates human rights. But at the same time, it's connected with all the cartels and different criminal organizations all around the world. So this torture thing is a common practice between the different police or security movement of the government of the Nicolas Mauro regime. So we are really happy that Nicolas Mauro is right now facing the justice in the U.S. but we know that it's not enough that we need also to have a transition to democracy in Venezuela because the regime del C. Rodriguez is still in power.
- [26:34]
Bianna Golodriga
You were in a windowless cell. If we go back to that date of January 3, when the explosions began, I know you were unaware of what was happening. You only learned two days later that Maduro was actually captured by the United States. In that moment when you were isolated, did you comprehend that this could in fact be the end of his regime or Nicolas Maduro's reign over the country? And what were you thinking about how that would impact you?
- [27:06]
Jesus Armas
So it was a really weird moment because as you described, we didn't have any window in the cell. So in that moment, we listened to a big explosion that was really, really loud. And we saw the members of the Maduro secret police or the guards running.
- [27:23]
Senator Roger Wicker
Around.
- [27:26]
Jesus Armas
Without any notion about what was happening. And we saw in that moment that maybe it could be related with the United States. And then when we really realized that Maduro has gone, that he was in Brooklyn, we started to think that maybe there was a real opportunity for a transition to democracy.
- [27:50]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
Yeah.
- [27:50]
Bianna Golodriga
And rights groups now in the country, as we are seeing some ease over the authoritarian rule of that country, we are seeing a bit more freedom, more political prisoners released, though not all. And I'll get to that in just a second. There is concern among rights groups that the United States is prioritizing some sort of stabilization right now as opposed to democracy and elections.
- [28:17]
Jesus Armas
For us, the priority is to have a free and fair election, a general election where people can choose their national assembly representative, their president, their mayors, their governors. Because right now we live under a regime that, of course, it doesn't have any legitimacy. So we want to organize the people in the next few months to. To put more pressure on the regime and to achieve this election, because the regime is going to try to stay in power, is going to try to stall another election. If we have an election, they will do whatever they can do to stay in power and to keep the repression and the authoritarianism in Venezuela. So we now need a United States that can commit not only with the economical transition in Venezuela, which is really important, you know, that Venezuela was a few years ago in a humanitarian crisis, but also that can commit, really commit to have an election this year. So, of course, for us is our main concern.
- [29:34]
Michelle Martin
Yeah.
- [29:34]
Bianna Golodriga
And Secretary Rubio said that that is the U.S. s goal, too, to one day have elections. It may not be, though, as soon as this year. As soon as you. The United States has already started to roll back sanctions. President Trump has repeated that Delsey Rodriguez is somebody that he can work with, that his administration can work with. The energy Secretary was just in Venezuela last week meeting with Delsey Rodriguez. And we know that prioritizing the oil and control over the oil has been a top focus of this administration. We haven't heard President Trump speak much about upcoming elections. And when you look at even recent polling since the last few weeks, Maria Karina Machad, your candidate would win 67% of the vote, compared to 25% that would go to Delsey Rodriguez. If that support is so clear, are you concerned as to why the United States isn't then pushing for an election sooner?
- [30:31]
Jesus Armas
I think that statements like the statement of the Secretary of Energy about elections are really important at that. We will have enough pressure in Venezuela and also enough organization of the civil society and the opposition in the next few months that we will have the Opportunity to achieve a general election. That's our plan. That's our goal, to have a general free and fair election.
- [31:07]
Bianna Golodriga
Well, we know the government says that it wants reconciliation in the country through an amnesty bill. There are 644 political prisoners that remain behind bars right now. Families holding hunger strikes outside of these prisons until their loved ones are released. I know you say that this amnesty law, as is, is not far enough, does not go far enough in releasing and giving amnesty to all of those political prisoners. If you can just give us a sense of what your experience was behind bars in one of the most notorious prisons in that region of the country, which by the way, we should note is there's now discussions about turning that prison facility into a community center. I'd love to get your thoughts on that too.
- [31:53]
Jesus Armas
So I have four stages in my prison experience. The first stage was about torture, was to be disappeared by the Maduro secret police, was to be in a clandestine safe house being tortured and also being interrogated for hours. They wanted to know where was the Marekurina Machao location, the Juan Paulo Guanipa location. So after that they moved me to Sona Siete, which is the place where the people are right now in hunger stride. And there's maybe the health on earth. There was a place where I have to live in a really small cell with 37 other people that were in a really, really bad shape. Actually a lot of them were sick and they didn't receive any medical attention. And also we have to live with rats. There were rats everywhere. There was no bathroom inside of the cell. So the people have to go to a bathroom in these plastic bags. And there was a lot of cruelty by the guards. So it was a really, really hard time. Then I was moved to Elicoyde and in the Elicoyde I live under psychological pressure. On the psychological torture. We were treated a lot. We were all the time under interrogation process that lasted for hours. For example, that maybe interrogate me at 10am then at 2pm and then they woke me up at 2 or 3am and asked me again and again the same questions. And I was isolated. I was isolated for 10 months without any information about my family, without any information about my girlfriend. I didn't know that if my dad was dead or he was alive. And also my family was really scared because they didn't know if I was really alive. So it was really exhausting, really hard for me to go through this experience. And finally after January 3rd, the thing changed and so they started to give me visits. So after two 12, 13 months, I have the opportunity to talk with my mom, to talk with my girlfriend, and they started to treat us better, to give them more time under the sun, to give us more time to exercise. So this was like hell. But believe me, we are stronger now, and we know that everything we did have a value. And it's going to have this big prize at the end, which is democracy.
- [34:57]
Bianna Golodriga
Yeah, hell on earth is one way to describe it. El Helicoya is what is being now discussed to turn into a community center. Final question for you, Jesus. You are still under court supervision. You're required to report to authorities every month as you are a free man right now, you're being watched. So I'm wondering, why risk it? Why speak out now the way you are with the media and with me?
- [35:23]
Jesus Armas
Actually, they want to change these conditions and maybe to put more pressure on me and maybe put some more restrictions. So let's see in this week what will happen. But the thing is that I don't have any other option. My only option is to fight for freedom, is to fight for democracy, to fight for a better country. Because I will never be free until we have political prisoner, innocent political prisoners inside these places that are the hel. As we said a few moments ago, I will never be free until we don't have democracy. So I will fight hand by hand with Maria Corina Matau and other freedom fighters from Venezuela until we got this transition to democracy.
- [36:13]
Bianna Golodriga
And after everything you've gone through, you still say that you are optimistic about the future of your country and the Venezuelan people. Jesus, thank you so much for taking the time. Really appreciate it.
- [36:25]
Jesus Armas
Thank you so much.
- [36:27]
Bianna Golodriga
And we'll be right back after this short break.
- [36:36]
President Zelenskyy
Tev, I Got News for your ears. The podcast. I am your host, Michael Ian Black.
- [36:42]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
When I misbehave, I usually have a.
- [36:44]
Michelle Martin
Sense of guilt about it, right?
- [36:46]
Bianna Golodriga
They don't have that.
- [36:47]
Michelle Martin
They obviously don't have that.
- [36:48]
President Zelenskyy
It seems like that.
- [36:49]
Senator Roger Wicker
Right?
- [36:50]
Bianna Golodriga
It definitely seems like that.
- [36:51]
President Zelenskyy
Like someone like Lutnick will just blatantly lie to an interviewer, as we've seen. And then in the Epstein Files comes out, and he's like, I met that guy once. Was like, he's a disgusting pig.
- [37:02]
Christiane Amanpour
Haven't seen him.
- [37:03]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
Gross.
- [37:03]
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte
He's gross.
- [37:03]
Senator Roger Wicker
Awful.
- [37:04]
President Zelenskyy
Haven't seen him since two. And it turns out they're in business together.
- [37:07]
Michelle Martin
They're literally in business together.
- [37:09]
President Zelenskyy
Have I Got News for your Ears. Releases new episodes every Wednesday. Don't miss an episode. Follow us wherever you get your podcasts.
- [37:22]
Bianna Golodriga
Does America have a marijuana problem. The New York Times editorial board argues in a recent opinion piece that it does. And it's certainly true that in just over 10 years, attitudes to. To the drug have changed dramatically. It's now legal in some 40 states for medical use, 24 for recreational use, and it's more common to use cannabis daily than it is alcohol. That's according to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health. But is it as safe as regular users think? Margaret Haynie is a neurobiology professor at Columbia University Medical center and has spent decades researching how marijuana affects the brain. She joins Michelle Martin to unpack the latest data.
- [38:03]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
Thanks, Bianna. Dr. Margaret Haney, thank you so much for talking with us.
- [38:07]
Michelle Martin
I'm very happy to be here.
- [38:08]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
You've studied cannabis for 30 years. You've studied cannabis. It's the health effects for some 30 years now. How did you get started in this? And the reason I ask is it's not easy to study a drug that is considered illegal in the United States, even if it's for medical research.
- [38:25]
Michelle Martin
Yeah, no, it's a really good question. It's.
- [38:28]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
It's.
- [38:28]
Michelle Martin
I don't think the public is aware of how difficult it is to study cannabis. So I got into it because I was studying the cocaine addiction. It was. It was kind of the era of crack cocaine. And I was doing a lot of research looking at potential treatment medications for cocaine, which is an easier drug to study, believe it or not, because it's not Schedule 1 because it's considered to have some medicinal benefit. So while I was doing this back in the. In the 90s, this paper came out showing that there's a cannabis withdrawal that you could precipitate in rats. And it really blew our minds. We did not think something like withdrawal to cannabis existed. This was to thc. So we enrolled daily cannabis smokers. They lived in the lab with us. We had the licenses and approvals in place to give them cannabis. And then when we switched their active cannabis to placebo cannabis, we could track a whole withdrawal syndrome to cannabis. And this was the 90s, and it got me completely immersed in the field. But when it comes to studying cannabis, I have to have cannabis stored in a gun safe in a drug room. I get in with my fingerprints treated like as if I were giving people heroin. So it's. It's an extraordinarily difficult drug to study as a Schedule 1 drug. You need DEA license, you need narcotics control license, you need FDA approval. It's a very high bar, and it's significantly limiting how we can study this plant that millions and millions of people are using, thinking it has medical benefit for which we don't have good scientific evidence for because we can't conduct these studies.
- [39:58]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
So when you saw that marijuana, cannabis was being legalized at a very rapid pace. Right. Were you relieved or were you worried?
- [40:08]
Michelle Martin
Yeah. So I have a lot of thoughts on that. Because it's still federally legal. States can do whatever they want. It doesn't matter federally. So it's federally illegal. So I still have to operate under those rules. So there's two things when you legalize. There's legalization for recreational, you know, use, and then there's medical cannabis. And what really, really bothered me was that politicians were basically deciding what was a medicine or not. You know, at one point in New Jersey, it was deemed a medication for glaucoma. In New York, it was illegal. So that's not the way we decide what a medicine is. So just as a scientist, it really made me crazy that in lieu of any evidence that's needed for every other drug and medication, cannabis got this backdoor entry as a medicine. Now, that's not to say it doesn't have therapeutic potential, but I think everyone would benefit if we could demonstrate what it has therapeutic potential for. This is a safe medication at this dose. It works for this indication. There's no data. So when you ask, they say, talk to your doctor. Your doctor doesn't have anything to go by about what dose or what indication. So it's a problem, the way we're treating it as a medicine for everything. I think there's like 60 indications, if you add them up across the United States and varies state by state. So how, you know, antidepressants don't vary state by state. It works in New Jersey, not in New York. So that's where we would. I would really want to start. Like, recreational use. That's a decision for voters to have. Do we want another legal intoxicant out there? Let's. Let's look at the pros and cons and decide federally. But in terms of the medicine, it really bothers me.
- [41:43]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
Well, it's already kind of decided. I mean, the fact is, a 2024 study from Carnegie Mellon University estimates that roughly 18 million Americans now use marijuana almost daily. That's up from under 1 million in 1992. The study shows that in 2022, for the first time, there were more daily or near daily users of cannabis than alcohol. Cannabis, when we talk about. What are we talking about is weed? Is it weed?
- [42:15]
Michelle Martin
Yes, it's the plants.
- [42:16]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
And so when you see people sort of selling, you know, THC products, is that the same thing?
- [42:23]
Michelle Martin
No, it can be, you know, quite different. And that's been the other enormous societal shift. So you have the plant, and the plant can only get up to, I don't know, maybe 25% Delta 9 THC. That's as good as you're going to get in terms of that. In the 70s, it was 1 to 4% THC. Now you can get up to 20, 25% THC. But the other thing is, now are these THC oils sold in pens? And then there's dabbing, and it's very concentrated THC. It can be up to 90% THC. That's a whole other can of worms like the plant. We kind of understand and know what to do, how to handle, understand its effects. But these very, very high concentrated solutions of THC that are so easy in the vape pens to mask and to hide and to use in school and so forth, that's a real concern.
- [43:15]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
What are some of the things that people thought were true when there was this big push to decriminalize and then legalize that turn out just not to be true?
- [43:24]
Michelle Martin
Well, like the one near and dear to my heart is addiction. You know, the way we define a use disorder, there's a list of criteria, and all the drugs share the same criteria. Do you undergo withdrawal? Are you giving up important things in your life for the drug? You know, is it disrupting your family and job? You know, there's a series of criteria, and the more you meet, the more severe your use disorder is. When I started, the notion was laughed at that that addiction to cannabis can occur. And now people are seeing it. And I think most significantly, all the people who start using cannabis for therapeutic reasons are developing a use disorder. If you're using cannabis for pain, what are you gonna do? You're gonna use, as soon as you wake up, you're gonna use it. As soon as it wears off, you're gonna use it repeatedly throughout the day. These are enormous risk factors for developing a use disorder.
- [44:14]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
You, as a medical researcher are saying you are seeing people who are really sick, who are having serious health effects, who are unable to stop using if they want to. I'm just curious, like, why is there this big disconnect between what you're seeing in the health field and what our sort of public conversation about it is?
- [44:32]
Michelle Martin
Yes, completely. And I think that's the public conversation we have to have. And I think it's been this halo effect around cannabis. Parents have been kind of unsure what to say to their kids because they don't think it's all that terrible. We have our own endocannabinoid system. We have this part of our brain that where THC binds and it goes under tremendous development in the adolescent years. That's when your brain develops and to be exposing it to high levels of THC on a daily basis is a risk factor. There's consequences for educational achievement, psychiatric outcomes, a range of things. So the point being, and what I would try to say to my own sons is it's a big difference between smoking every day when you're 14 and when you're 34. That really matters. And that's something again, error. ER doctors talk about the high incidence of psychiatric consequences of people who are smoking. And the younger you start, the more vulnerable you are to developing cannabis use disorder, but also having psychiatric and other outcomes.
- [45:32]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
What I think I hear you saying is that you can actually have psychiatric impacts from heavy use, daily use, near daily use. Why is that?
- [45:43]
Michelle Martin
There is something cannabis induced psychosis that is increasingly pretty common. These receptors where THC binds are in every part of the brain in areas that are important for mood and mood regulation and so forth. But there is an association between a lot of cannabis use and development of these psychiatric symptoms, psychosis being one of them. That's the other thing that I really care about. If you think about, if you look at surveys as to why people seek medical cannabis, the three topics reasons are pain, anxiety and sleep well, all three of those have an enormous placebo response. That means if you know, you have society telling you this plant is going to cure what ails you, the placebo response, People taking something they think is going to help them have a tremendously high success rate. They literally feel better. Their pain neurobiology lessens when they take a placebo that they think is going to help. So placebos work so people do feel better. This just can't be our medical policy. This is why we need to bring good science to this question, because we need to account for every other medication. You have to compare it to a placebo and say the medication is superior. It's not expectation. We don't have that for cannabis. And the few studies that have done that have not really panned out.
- [47:06]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
You're saying that even if people are using cannabis every day, can't stop if they want to, somehow they don't see it as a problem or they don't understand that it is a problem, like why Is there this halo effect? Is it because it's a plant? Because people think, oh, it's a plant?
- [47:23]
Michelle Martin
I think it was because it was so unreasonably demonized for so long. Really was. I mean, when I started, my participants were thrown in jail constantly for having a nickel bag in their pocket. You know, they'd go through the system for the week. And it was so demonized for so long. I think the whole every. Everyone was just like, enough. This is. This.
- [47:43]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
This.
- [47:43]
Michelle Martin
This went too far in that direction. This is just my. My own thought on this. And now it went on the complete other direction, which is why it was very hard to bring up any negative consequences to cannabis because people were like, we don't want to hear this.
- [47:55]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
We don't want to hear it.
- [47:56]
Michelle Martin
Yeah, we're not ready for this. Now again, it seems to me people are starting to recognize, of course it's a. It's a drug with that. That can be misused, and it's a drug with potential therapeutic consequences. But that doesn't mean it's all good or all bad. It's. It's something in between. And if people can come into it recognizing if I'm using it for my pain every day, I might run the risk of developing a problem with it. I don't think anyone's warned of that.
- [48:22]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
And you touched on this a bit earlier. There was a joint study between Danish researchers and the NIH looking at more than 6 million people in Denmark, and they found a strong link between cannabis use disorder and schizophrenia, especially among young men. I mean, it was estimated that up to 30% of schizophrenia cases in men age 21 to 30 might not have occurred without heavy cannabis use. Like, there's a link there. Can you say more about that?
- [48:50]
Michelle Martin
Yeah, there's definitely a link. There is a strong association between cannabis use and psychotic symptoms. And including psychotic disorders, the causality of the link is still tricky. So we know there's a link, just like we know there's a link between early onset cannabis use and worse educational outcome. The trick is the causality of it. So I remain a tiny bit agnostic about causality, but there is a strong association between cannabis and, you know, psychotic symptoms.
- [49:24]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
Do we have enough to know that there's a difference between occasional use and heavy use? Is there a difference and what defines the difference?
- [49:33]
Michelle Martin
Yeah, you know, it's hard for us to say, like, what levels acceptable and what's not, clinically, what's not what. What is a big red flag for me is. Is morning use, wake and Bake. You know, somebody who's doing that, to me, that's. They're showing. If you're doing that every day, you're really showing signs of an increased likelihood of a cannabis use disorder. But, you know, clearly the poison's in the dose. So, you know, if you're, you know, before going to bed two nights a week, you know, smoke half a joint, you know, I'm not going to be. It's all proportionate, just like the person who has a glass of wine on a Saturday night. You know, of course, it all depends on the dose. So there's no hard and fast rule, there's different vulnerabilities. But daily use, repeatedly repeated use throughout the day, these are all the things that are red flags for me.
- [50:18]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
So there was an NIH study that found that daily cannabis smoking was associated with a 25% higher likelihood of heart attack and a 42% higher likelihood of stroke. Why might that be?
- [50:31]
Michelle Martin
Yeah, I mean, one of its very, very reliable and robust effects is to increase heart rate. And, you know, not to the level that cocaine does, but it's a very reliable 10 to 15 beats per minute increase in heart rate. And I think if there's underlying vulnerability in any way, that if somebody's vulnerable cardiovascularly, that could be one consequence.
- [50:51]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
You started hearing people talk about big weed, you know, big weed in the same way that people used to talk about Big Pharma.
- [50:58]
Michelle Martin
Yeah.
- [50:58]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
Okay, so what impact does the commercialization of the industry have on the issues that you've been working on?
- [51:07]
Michelle Martin
No, it has a tremendous impact because they're driving the narrative because the science can't get done and it's, you know, the horse is out of the barn and everyone's gobbling up for every indication we can't keep up. They're driving the narrative. They're selling, you know, there's dispensaries. If I can leave the viewers with one, piece of advice is do not believe a word your very friendly budtender tells you in a dispensary, because they're making it up. They're, they're, they're claiming the cannabid gyro content is going to help with this and that cannot. Cannabidiol content is going to help with that. It's nonsense. It's made up. It's based on in vitro data or mice data at best. They are marked, they're marketers and, and they're driven by the cannabis industry. So this is hugely distressing to me. The other avenue I care about greatly is pregnant use during pregnancy and not to demonize anybody, but again, you call a dispensary and say, I'm nauseated and I'm pregnant, they're going to tell you to come right in and get a particular product. Another time of tremendous brain development. Not a good time to be introducing cannabis or cannabinoids. That's distressing to me.
- [52:15]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
For people who are listening to our conversation, whether they don't use it all, whether they're occasional users, whether they're considering it, whether they think, gee, I am in chronic pain, I'd like to be more comfortable. How would you go about creating a risk benefit analysis for yourself?
- [52:29]
Michelle Martin
I think I just would leave people with there are consequences to using cannabis. I mean, it can, depending on how you're taking it, it could affect metabolism of other drugs, it increases heart rate. There are consequences. It's not the, it's not the worst drug in the world, but there are consequences to using it. And whatever the budtenders tell you, you can just forget. Don't, don't trust that. Don't trust them at all. You know, that's something I really want to emphasize.
- [52:59]
Neurobiologist Margaret Haney
Dr. Margaret Haney, thanks so much for talking with us.
- [53:01]
Michelle Martin
You bet. Very happy to be here.
- [53:05]
Bianna Golodriga
And finally, samba singing and sparkle. It is of course, carnival time. All over South America, millions of revelers have been partying in the streets marking the annual festival. In each country it's celebrated, people have their own special take. In Rio, Brazil, on top of the world famous samba parade, there are also hundreds of street parties known as blocos. In northern Argentina, performers enact a ceremony called the Descent of the Devils to begin the season. And in Bolivia's El Alto City, indigenous traditions take center stage with dances honoring Mother Earth and the beginning of the harvest season. A happy carnival to all celebrating. Love these images. All right, that is it for now. If you ever miss our show, you can find the latest episode shortly after it airs on our podcast. Remember, you can always catch us online on our website and all over social media. Thanks so much for watching. And guys, goodbye from New York.
- [54:19]
President Zelenskyy
Hey, I'm Anderson Cooper.
- [54:20]
Senator Roger Wicker
On my podcast All There Is, we explore grief and loss in all its complexities. You'll hear deeply moving and honest discussions with people who have faced and are living with life altering losses. My guest is writer poet Megan Fowley, who was married to the poet Andrea Gibson.
- [54:37]
President Zelenskyy
Andrea died last summer after a years.
- [54:39]
Senator Roger Wicker
Long battle with cancer. Is grief different than you thought it would be?
- [54:43]
Michelle Martin
Yes, it is.
- [54:45]
Bianna Golodriga
I don't think that I thought that I would be able to have as much joy as I've had. I guess if I wasn't able to.
- [54:56]
Michelle Martin
Find joy and laughter now, I would have missed the point of Andrea's messaging.
- [55:03]
Senator Roger Wicker
Talking, grief, building community. That's what the podcast is all about.
- [55:07]
President Zelenskyy
This is all there is.
- [55:09]
Senator Roger Wicker
Listen and follow wherever you get your podcasts.