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- [00:01]
Bianna Golodryga
Grainger knows when you're a procurement manager for an office park, you're not managing one building, you're managing all of them. And to stay ahead, you need to
- [00:09]
Ivy Meeropol
see through walls and around corners.
- [00:11]
Bianna Golodryga
Lights about to fail, filters ready to clog H Vac on its last leg. If you wait until something breaks, you're already behind. Count on Grainger for quality products, easy reordering and 24. 7 support. Call 1-800-GRAINGER click grainger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. Hello, everyone, and welcome to Amanpour. Here's what's coming up. Iran suspends talks with the US After Israel escalates in Lebanon. Could the cease fire collapse? We'll have the details then. After weeks of bombardment, conditions inside Iran are deteriorating fast. Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council Jan Eglund explains the terrible price civilians across the region are paying for this war. Plus, if you were concerned about being dragged through the mud, why would you
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E. Jean Carroll
choose to sue Donald Trump?
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Bianna Golodryga
Because he called me a liar and
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E. Jean Carroll
I couldn't let it stand.
- [01:14]
Bianna Golodryga
The woman who took on Trump and won E. Jean Carroll sued President Trump for defamation and sexual assault. Now sources say the DoJ has launched a criminal investigation into Carol over perjury allegations. A new documentary, ask E. Jean, tells Carol's remarkable story. Its director, Ivy Meeropol, joins me. Also ahead, bestselling author Jesmyn Ward speaks to Walter Isaacson about how storytelling has shaped her life and her grandmother's early advice to tell it straight and tell it all. Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Bianna Golodriga, New York sitting in for Christian Amanpour. We begin in the Middle east where Iranian state media reports that Tehran has suspended talks with the US in protest against Israel's intensifying activity in Lebanon. These were the scenes in Beirut earlier as civilians flooded out of the capital's southern suburbs. Israel has ordered the evacuation of the Dahiya area in the south of the city where the IDF is preparing to launch strikes against Hezbollah. It comes as Israel has been broadening its attacks across southern Lebanon. And after a warning from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Israel plans to send troops deeper into Lebanese territory. I want to get to Oren Lieberman, who is in Jerusalem for us. So, Oren, just this expanded operation by Israel here with Hezbol launching increased attacks against Israeli troops. Now Israel saying they're increasing the scope of their operation, initially saying that they had the support of the United States in this operation, but with Iran now saying that a cease fire between the us, Israel and Iran lies squarely in a cease fire between Israel and Hezbollah. Where do things stand?
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Oren Lieberman
Bianna, that's an excellent question, and that's what we're waiting to learn here. And that's because it was at 10:30 this morning, so about 11 hours ago or so, that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katze, they had announced that Israel would be striking Beirut and specifically the Dahia neighborhood, a southern suburb of the Lebanese capital that's considered a Hezbollah stronghold. What we have not seen since then is an actual attack on Beirut. An Israeli source said this had been coordinated with the US in advance or in real time. But it's likely, it seems that it's the US that hasn't actually given its approval to this. Normally, when you see not only an announcement of strikes, but even an evacuation warning for a specific area, it's not long afterwards that the Israeli military will carry out those strikes. We haven't seen that actually happen yet. So it's a very interesting moment here. It was just several hours after that Israeli announcement that Iran said it was suspending talks, partially because of the Israeli escalation in Lebanon and also because of more US Strikes on Iran. So the question is now where that leaves it. President Donald Trump said a short time ago that maybe it's not so bad if, if talks are suspended and there's less talking. He said there's been too much talking. Now, what that means is, is a bit unclear since that would leave the Strait of Hormuz closed and the energy markets riled. But it does leave this, this incredibly important question of where are talks headed and where are they going? Even if Israel hasn't begun striking Beirut yet, they have escalated elsewhere. Strikes in Tyre, we have seen one that according to Lebanese state media, damaged a hospital, although the strike itself was right next to the hospital and killed two people. We've seen strikes in Nabatiya and the Beqaa Valley. So in other places in Lebanon as well as we have seen Hezbollah fire rockets and drones not only at Israeli forces, but also deeper into northern Israel. So you see this escalation on the ground and Iran has very much tied what happens in Lebanon to the overall agreement, something that Israel has tried to avoid via in the middle of all this, the Trump administration is still trying to push forward with diplomacy between Israel and Lebanon, and that, as far as we know, is still set to take place in the coming days. The question is, how do you get anybody here to de escalate and that's something that Trump himself has to figure
- [05:36]
Bianna Golodryga
out, and I would argue only he can really control at this point. Point it is interesting because as you noted just a few moments ago in an interview with NBC News, he said that perhaps going silent would be very good, saying that he doesn't feel any pressure to reach a deal quickly and that he could hold the blockade for as long as it takes. But this comes after the weekend when this proposed MoU between Iran and the United States reports coming out saying that President Trump under pressure, perhaps is now or was demanding tougher asks from Iran, and it was just a waiting game for Iran to respond. How do we interpret the fact then, so quickly after Israel expanded its operation in Lebanon, that we do see a response from Iran?
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Oren Lieberman
Iran, when it wants to, apparently can respond relatively quickly within several hours and doesn't take days to come to a broader consensus, at least behind what is likely a small group of decision makers at the top of the regime. The reports were that the US And Iran were fairly close to an agreement and that Trump was going in on Fridays to a security meeting to make a final decision. And yet he comes out of that. Officials who spoke with CNN told us looking for changes on nuclear issue. Stronger wording there, as well as on the Strait of Hormuz. Well, those are the two key issues and that delays the entire process. Meanwhile, despite Trump repeatedly claiming that IR wants a deal and they want it quickly, Iran has shown absolutely no leverage or pressure to get to a deal quickly. And they are very much taking their time, feeling as if they're negotiating from a position of strength. And for them, it's a waiting game. And it's the US Waiting with high gas prices. And that clearly affects Trump domestically versus the economic impact of of the US Blockade. Who can wait for that longer? Iran is betting it's them that can wait.
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Bianna Golodryga
Right. And add to that the ongoing or expanded fighting between Israel and Hezbollah. There is also political pressure on Prime Minister Netanyahu facing elections in just a short period of time, a few months from now, as soon as September, perhaps even, where he has constantly been under pressure and promising the Israeli public that he would be able to degrade Hezbollah's capabilities. That does not seem to be the case, as more and more soldiers and even civilian areas continue to be so. Where does that put him vis a vis his relationship with President Trump and the Israeli public?
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Oren Lieberman
Well, one thing that's clear is Benjamin Netanyahu will never say a cross word about Donald Trump in public. But Trump obviously has all the leverage and all the pressure on Netanyahu here. And if Netanyahu wants to escalate, if he wants to strike Beirut, it will take Trump's approval there. Now, Netanyahu has looked for a decisive victory. He hasn't gotten that in Iran. He hasn't gotten it in Gaza. And right now, he doesn't have it in Lebanon vis a vis Hezbollah. Hezbollah has been very effective. They don't have the rocket and missile arsenal that they had. They don't have the forces that they had. But they've used first person drones very effectively to exact a price on Israeli forces and on the country itself. And that means that Netanyahu is looking for a victory that Trump may not allow him to have. If Trump wants that cease fire with Iran.
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Bianna Golodryga
Yeah. These are the same types of drones that we become quite familiar with now on the battlefield in Ukraine as well. Oren Lieberman, good to see you. Thanks so much. Well, now, as this war could be escalating again, it is civilians who are paying the price. After months under siege, Iran's economy and infrastructure has been badly damaged and people there are reporting shortages of some basic foods. The Norwegian Refugee Council is working on the ground in Iran and it is warning that millions have already been displaced and tens of thousands killed or injured. The NRC Secretary General, Jan Eglund, is in Tehran right now and he joins me from there. So you have described civilian life, Jan, as turned upside down since this war began. One would argue that even prior to the initial bombs dropping in February, the Iranian people were under dire straits there, both from a humanitarian standpoint, politically. But tell us what you are seeing on the ground since you've been back this time most recently?
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Jan Eglund
Well, in the four days that I have been crisscrossing northwestern Iran. And now in Tehran, you see the traces of the intense bombardment everywhere. There was tens of thousands of missiles and rockets and impacts in the country. But it's a huge place. And of course, now normalcy is coming to Tehran. 11 million inhabitants. But what's forgotten is that there are four and a half million Afghan refugees here. And they were also in a very difficult situation. As you just indicated before this war, it's become worse for them because also now the Iranian civilian population has been suffering. Millions have left. Many have come back. I have seen many apartment houses destroyed. I've seen schools damaged, hospitals damaged. It has had an enormous consequence. And more than anything, people are feeling the economic fallout of this conflict.
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Bianna Golodryga
Yeah. And the economy was in shambles even prior to this war. I mean, to remind viewers that the tens of thousands who were reported to have been killed. The mass protests that we saw, that was spurred by the deteriorating, the quickly deteriorating economic situation in the country. If I could just pick back up on what you said about the impact on Afghan refugees because I think it's important for our viewers to know. 4.4 million Afghan refugees are in Iran. That's one of the world's largest refugee populations. Sanctions, the economy, obviously inflation and employment hitting them. Have you been able to speak with any of these refugees and what are they telling you? If so,
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Jan Eglund
I've been seeing a lot of Afghan refugees families in this visit. We in the Norwegian Refugee Council, we're a frontline organization. We have been working in Iran now since 2012. We're also in Lebanon, we're in Gaza, we're in Syria, we're in all of the war affected countries of the region. What we feel is that very often the civilian population is forgotten. And more than anyone, the refugees among them, this Iran is the largest refugee hosting country on Earth. There are many more Afghan refugees here than there would be in North America or in Europe combined. They have been here, some of them for 40 years, still in a very vulnerable position, even though they have gotten education and some health care because many are undocumented. Many have come here since the Taliban took over in Afghanistan. And they cannot return to Afghanistan because the situation is so dire there for them to lose the jobs of the breadwinner, the father very often in construction. The mother has been often a domestic worker for Iranian families. All of that work is gone. And I was today in a family of nine Afghans. There were three disabled with difficulties, disabilities in the family. They were in a small flat. The father of the family was the only breadwinner. He was a shoemaker. His salary could barely make the rent that has gone up. So if they are not having relief from us in the Norwegian Refugee Council, they will be in the streets. That is forgotten in the donor countries because they are giving us so little support for work in Iran for the refugees.
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Bianna Golodryga
And that just raises concerns about sectarian tension now in the country. As you're seeing Iranians, Afghans, others that are now having to fight for scarce resources and jobs. So inflation, as you note, is climbing. Staples, we're reporting like meat, medicine, fuel, are getting harder to find and afford. How is that affecting, first of all your colleagues and the work that you're doing? But I would say more importantly, everyday life for those in Iran today,
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Jan Eglund
it's affecting everybody. You know, when you travel in Iran, it looks as if there is normalcy coming back. The traffic, famous traffic jams of Tehran are back. However, lots of shops have closed, industries have closed down. The ports have been blockaded by the us Just as Iran is now blockading the Strait of Homuz. That is having an enormous economic consequences for the whole region, but definitely for the Iranian civilian population. And the most vulnerable are the refugees. So it has a cascading effect. People are exhausted, people are yearning for a diplomatic solution. There has to be a diplomatic solution. A return to war would be utterly senseless and utterly reckless, and it would cost millions into horrific suffering.
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Bianna Golodryga
We know that the partial Internet access has been restored in the country. The majority of it is still in the dark. But even with that, I'm just curious, from those that you are speaking with the families there, how aware are they or up to speed with the status of the ceasefire and where the war and how it impacts their everyday life?
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Jan Eglund
We're talking together now because of the partial lifting of the Internet ban. Before that, we had to travel all the time to UN colleagues to talk, use their one hour a day Internet connection. Now more people are online. The rumors are ripe. What is Trump meaning today? What will happen tomorrow? What will Iran say? What kind of response will that be? How would the Lebanese war affect the situation here? People are worried for the future. The fear is intense because the country is gripped in the aftermath of a horrific war and fearing another one.
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Bianna Golodryga
Right. I mean, I can only imagine how traumatized a country of 90 million is at this point, having experienced now a war, a ceasefire perhaps, that's very fragile and obviously leading up to that, the slaughter of their own neighbors. The Norwegian Refugee Council is reporting, and you touched on this just a moment ago, that only about a third of the funding that you need for emergency relief is coming in. Just explain to us what that means, how that presents itself in the way you are then able to help those in need the most.
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Jan Eglund
Yeah, because we're underfunded everywhere. Now, humanitarian funding from the United States and from many other of the most generous donors have gone down, radically down at the time when we have record needs and record numbers of displaced and refugees. It means in Iran, as it means in Lebanon and in Gaza and in Syria and elsewhere that we have to choose whom to give emergency relief and whom to drop. Where will we cut food rations to starving families? That's the reality now of a world where there is money for billions and billions and billions of dollars for military campaigns that look as if they're solving nothing, solving nothing. In the Middle east war and the Gulf War, in Lebanon, in Gaza and elsewhere, and we're not even having funding to. To feed starving children. It's very frustrating for us who are in the midst of this.
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Bianna Golodryga
Strikes have reportedly damaged about 150,000 homes, schools and other buildings. How is that just physical damage? I mean, I know you say on the one hand, it does seem like life is coming back to somewhat of a normal state, but given all of that damage to infrastructure, what does that mean for those that are going to school, wanting to go to work and needing medical care?
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Jan Eglund
Well, of course, tens of thousands of buildings have destroyed and damaged, but of course, there are millions of structures in a huge place like Iran. However, I mean, 17 million children hasn't been to school for two months. They will not resume education in class until the autumn after the summer break. Here, it means that half a year will be gone of education for children in Iran. 70 million children, Iranian and Afghan. I met many of them today and yesterday, and they would like to be back in school, which is normalcy, which is also for us, an ability to give trauma.
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Bianna Golodryga
I want to end by just talking to our viewers about how important it is to get aid to those who need it most. And there have been concerns, even reports, that the Iranian authorities could be diverting aid, could be diverting food, humanitarian resources. So explain to our viewers about where that aid would be going and how to make sure that it avoids filling the coffers of the regime and goes to the people that need it most.
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Jan Eglund
Well, I have 100 aid workers on the ground here in Iran. We are interviewing each and every family about their needs. We ensure that the funding goes directly to the family that are homeless, that are like the family I just mentioned. Nine family members, three disabled, and they will be on the street unless we give them this subsidy for rent as an emergency measure. We have total control of our work for the refugees, whether that is in Iran or Lebanon or Gaza or Syria or anywhere else. I would say, and I've been in this now for 40 years, there's better control of funding for humanitarian relief, monitoring, evaluation, auditing than there would be for most private and public spending, including military spending elsewhere. Those who would like to help us aid people now that are being displaced and starving can be sure that this will reach the people in most need.
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Bianna Golodryga
That's really important for our viewers to hear. You did mention Gaza, and I do want to ask you about the lines that we've heard recently from Prime Minister Netanyahu. Under the deal back In October, the IDF was to hold 53% of the Strip. Now Prime Minister Netanyahu said he wants to expand that to 70%. This is as they're still struggling to have Hamas disarm in the enclave. And so that raises the question about the humanitarian situation there. What are your aid workers on the ground, if you still have any in Gaza? What are they telling you about the latest needs?
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Jan Eglund
They are telling us that the deep desperation is widening. I mean, Gaza is a tiny place and more and more is taken by the military machine of Netanyahu, that they are crammed together in a smaller and smaller space and they are 60, 70, 80% women and children that have nothing, nothing to do with Hamas. Hamas has not disarmed. Yes. Israel has not withdrawn as they should. No one has been following up the Trump peace plan and the United States is not pushing it through as they promised us to do. Israel has on its side cut out most of the American and European and international aid groups from Gaza. There are fewer and fewer that are allowed to do normal work there. There is no compassion with the Palestinian civilians. It's only now men with guns and power that are in some kind of a match for something. And the civilian population is suffering more and more.
- [24:17]
Bianna Golodryga
Jan Eglund, I hate to leave it on such a pessimistic note, but you are giving us a lay of the land right now. Really appreciate your time and all the work that you're doing on the ground there in Iran. Thank you. And do stay with cnn. We will be right back after the break.
- [24:38]
Craig Ferguson
Craig Ferguson is going coast to coast to unpack what it really means to be an American today.
- [24:42]
Jan Eglund
What could possibly go wrong?
- [24:43]
Craig Ferguson
CRAIG ferguson, American on purpose. New episodes now streaming on the CNN app. Go to CNN.com watch to subscribe or log in with your TV provider.
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Bianna Golodryga
Next to one woman versus the president of the United States. Magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll stunned the world in 2019 when she wrote in a memoir that Donald Trump had raped her in the 1990s. Trump has denied the allegations, but Carroll has since sued him twice for defamation and sexual assault and won. Now things have once again escalated as new reporting reveals that the DOJ is investigating Carol for possible perjury during her testimony. It's an extraordinary saga. And a new documentary, ask E. Jean, is looking at the woman at the center of it. Here's a short clip.
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E. Jean Carroll
All my dreams were about becoming an advice columnist. And then Roger Ailes gave me my own TV show.
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Oren Lieberman
You don't really care who comments on anything because, I mean, you comment on everything
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Bianna Golodryga
if you were concerned about being dragged through the mud, why would you
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E. Jean Carroll
choose to sue Donald Trump?
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Bianna Golodryga
Because he called me a liar and I couldn't let it stand. Director Ivy Meeropol joins me now from Los Angeles with more. Ivy, welcome to the program. So this film, Ask E. Jean, is about a woman who publicly told her story in which she says she was sexually assaulted by Donald Trump. She beat Donald Trump in court twice, continued to be insulted by Trump, threatened by his followers, and now facing, as we reported, new threats from the Justice Department that CNN was the first to report. You describe this documentary as a wildly uncertain and at times terrifying ride. Just tell us what drew you to this story and to E. Jean in particular.
- [26:41]
Ivy Meeropol
Sure. Well, so in 2019, when E. Jean first published the excerpt from her book what Do We Need Men For, I read it in New York magazine, as many people did, and I did not know anything about Eugene Carroll particularly. And I was so struck by her voice, how unapologetic it was and how she was kind of refusing to be flattened in the way that women who come forward with these stories often do. And I just, I reached out to her and I was just, I didn't expect her to be as funny and as brave and inspiring as she turned out to be. So that's really, that was the hook for how I first began this long, over six year journey with her.
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Bianna Golodryga
And you have a name for people who cross Donald Trump, the Trump effect. Were you afraid at all throughout any of the process of making the film over the course of six years, you know, the president going from being president to then being candidate to losing and then running again and winning in 2024. Were you worried at all personally about how this would impact you?
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Ivy Meeropol
I did at times actually worry. It was unclear who would be targeted for being part of telling the story and bringing it out. We had a lot of trouble raising money. We had trouble once we did raise money with people feeling nervous and wanting their names off the film. And so of course that starts to have a chilling effect on everybody involved. But, but I always say it's difficult to spend time with E. Jean Carroll and Robby Kaplan on this, you know, on their pursuit of justice made all of us who did stick with the film feel braver.
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Bianna Golodryga
Robby Kaplan being E. Jean Carroll's attorney. So just for our viewers who weren't familiar with E. Jean prior to these cases, she was a well known public figure in New York City, had her own program offering advice to women. In many ways a trailblazer in this field, writing first in print and then going on tv. Just talk about who she was at her height. And there was a real moment in this film where she's speaking with one of her friends who recalled that at one point, you know, Donald Trump, you know, we all know him as a larger than life celebrity in the 90s and early 2000s, and then obviously President of the United States and most powerful person in the world. But at that time, her friend really said, E. Jean, you were more prominent than he was for many people. Just tell us about her life.
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Ivy Meeropol
Sure. And that's a really important point. Just as an aside, when they met at the doors of Bergdorf Goodman and now, you know, Trump famously has said that he didn't know her at all. He recognized her first as the advice. You're that advice lady. And she said, you're that real estate tycoon. So. So, yes, that.
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E. Jean Carroll
Excuse me.
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Bianna Golodryga
Oh, I can hear you. Sorry, go on.
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Ivy Meeropol
Oh, sorry, I thought someone was talking to me. Someone else. Excuse me. Anyway, so Eugene was. And as I discovered, because as I said, I didn't know very much about her. She, at the time she met, ran into Donald Trump at Bergdorf gun, which was 1996. She had her own television show called the Ascii Jean show that Roger Ailes had given her on his network, America's Talking. She also had the most popular advice column in Elle magazine at the time. She was already well established as
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Bianna Golodryga
a
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Ivy Meeropol
major journalist, one of the only women writing for major magazines, particularly male magazines, male oriented magazines like Esquire and Outside. She became the first female editor at Playboy magazine and at Esquire. So she, you know, she was a very well established figure and a serious writer.
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Bianna Golodryga
As a popular advice columnist, E. Jean Carroll took a tough line on these very issues in telling women to let go of all of their guilt if they came to her and spoke of the abuses that they experienced. And she told them to press charges. But I want to play a clip from the documentary. As I noted when she was speaking with her friend Lisa Birnbach, who was a writer and humorist and who Eugene turned to immediately after this experience that she says occurred with the president or with Trump at the time, she raised this, you know, why are you telling people to do certain things and you in fact, didn't for so many years. Let's play the clip.
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Ivy Meeropol
I was very disappointed that you wouldn't report him.
- [31:39]
E. Jean Carroll
But Lisa, they never would have believed me. I would have lost my. I would have been fired. I didn't have money to get an attorney. Everything I'd worked for would be dissipated.
- [31:49]
Bianna Golodryga
You said, don't ever speak of this again. Don't ever tell anyone this story as long as you live. Do I have your word?
- [32:01]
Ivy Meeropol
And you did.
- [32:02]
Bianna Golodryga
And that was that. So what did you end up learning, Ivy, about what ultimately led her to come out and speak her experience and her truth.
- [32:16]
Ivy Meeropol
So this was really the part of her story that made this film feel like so much more than just about Carol V. Trump. You know, Eugene was willing to look at herself in a. In a way that most people never, never do at age 75, kind of looking back at the advice she gave and how she accommodated men, meanwhile being this kind of this fierce, fearless person herself who stayed silent. So it was really the MeToo movement that galvanized Eugene, that she was so moved by the stories that were coming out and that they were actually gaining justice, that men were being held accountable, which is something Eugene hadn't experienced and didn't expect. And I think it really, it moved her so much. But it was also her own readers coming to her at that time and saying, we, you know, what do we do? We have, we have similar stories, similar experiences. What do we do now? And so it felt really pressing to her to tell her own stories, share them with her readers. And, you know, I look at it now as like caring about herself.
- [33:30]
Bianna Golodryga
On May 9, a jury found that Donald Trump was liable for sexual abuse and defamation and awarded e. Jean Carroll $5 million in damage. He has denied all of these charges and accusations to this day, calling this a fake story, a made up story, and he didn't testify in the first trial and he did testify in the second. And here's what he said about why he didn't testify in case the, the first.
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Walter Isaacson
This was a rigged deal. This was a. My lawyer said, sir, you don't have to do it. I actually said, I think I should. It would be respectful. They said, sir, don't do it. This is a fake story and you don't want to give it credibility.
- [34:10]
Bianna Golodryga
One thing you did do in this,
- [34:12]
Walter Isaacson
and I swear, and I've never done that, and I swear to, I have no idea who the hell she's a whack job.
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Bianna Golodryga
You didn't. And it was comments like this, both in interviews and on social media, that ultimately led Eugene to sue Donald Trump again. The second jury verdict was announced at $83.3 million in damages. I don't believe. Has any of that been paid yet?
- [34:38]
Ivy Meeropol
No, no, nothing.
- [34:40]
Bianna Golodryga
So then let me ask you your reaction to the news last week. Of an investigation perhaps from the doj. I don't know if it was confirmed from the DOJ just yet, but CNN had been reporting and is standing by that. Reporting Just your reaction to that news and what did Eugene say if you spoke with her recently?
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Ivy Meeropol
Well, I actually haven't spoken with Eugene recently. She, you know, they are really, she and Robby and the whole team are really in the midst of, you know, the two cases heading to the Supreme Court and then this recent attack from the doj. So I, you know, I, I've said I, you know, I found it unbelievable but not surprising. I mean, I did react very strongly and, but then started to think, well, you know, what it's, it's consistent, you know.
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Bianna Golodryga
Yeah.
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Ivy Meeropol
Starting with Comey and Letitia James. I mean, I think that, you know, there's, there is some pattern here of that's clear and I think, you know, I think when you watch the film, what's really important is that this film is the antidote to that. You know, he is this kind of bullying and trying to silence Eugene is, is very clear. And I don't, as far as I know, I mean, there are no, there are no facts that, that I can, I can cite or any way that give any credence to if, you know, this investigation, if it is a real investigation.
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Bianna Golodryga
Yeah.
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Ivy Meeropol
And the U.S. attorney I know is.
- [36:19]
Bianna Golodryga
U.S. attorney put out a. Eugene that I know. Sorry, don't mean to keep interrupting you. We're just tight on time. The U.S. attorney put out a statement saying that it has not opened and never opened a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll. I do want to ask you that. We have a few seconds left here. Just the connections here. Your grandparents were Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. They were the only American civilians who were executed for espionage related charges during the Cold War. You made a movie about their legacy and one about Roy Cohen, who happened to be President Trump's famous attorney. He keeps on saying, I need my own Roy Cohen. What was that like? Just the knowing the connection there going back so many generations for you?
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Ivy Meeropol
Well, I mean, you know, I think I have this, you know, kind of, it's, it's, it's in my DNA to kind of to, to want to expose, you know, abuse of power and also hold people accountable and seek justice. So I, you know, the, I made the Roy Cohn film right after Donald Trump was first elected because I wanted people to really understand where he comes from and who helped create him and this kind of culture of fear that has really infected our country right now. And specifically the process of making this film. And Eugene herself comes directly from that lineage.
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Bianna Golodryga
Ivy Miropol, thank you so much for the time. Really appreciate it. Thanks for sharing the film with us.
- [37:52]
Ivy Meeropol
Thank you for having me. Thank you.
- [37:54]
Bianna Golodryga
And we'll be right back after this short break.
- [38:01]
Craig Ferguson
Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile.
- [38:03]
Bianna Golodryga
I don't know if you knew this,
- [38:04]
Craig Ferguson
but anyone can get the Same premium
- [38:06]
Bianna Golodryga
wireless for 15amonth Plan that I've been enjoying.
- [38:09]
Craig Ferguson
It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistant's assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today. I'm told it's super easy to do@mintmobile.com
- [38:19]
Bianna Golodryga
Switch upfront payment of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent to $15 per month Required intro rate first 3 months only then full price plan opt taxes and fees extra. See full terms@mintmobile.com I'm CNN Tech reporter Claire Duffy. This week on the podcast Terms of Service. With me is Nathan Proctor. He's the senior director of the Right to Repair campaign. He'll share some tips for extending the life of your tech. When did you realize that this wasn't just an annoying thing that happens, but actually a systemic problem?
- [38:51]
Walter Isaacson
Frankly, nothing lasts like it used to. Like our clothes and furniture don't last as long as they did.
- [38:57]
Oren Lieberman
There's a really clear incentive for manufacturers of to create short lifespan products so that we have to buy more stuff. And that's exactly what's happening.
- [39:07]
Bianna Golodryga
Listen to CNN's Terms of Service wherever you get your podcasts. Now. Storytelling is a powerful tool for connection and for preserving the memories of our loved ones. That is particularly true for two time National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward, who has found solace in storytelling after her grandmother passed away from Alzheimer's. She joins Walter Isaacson to discuss her latest collection of essays and how her writing has helped restore her hope after despair.
- [39:41]
Walter Isaacson
Jasmine Ward, welcome to the show.
- [39:43]
E. Jean Carroll
It's good to be here.
- [39:45]
Walter Isaacson
The first chapter of your book ends with the six magic words I think of any writer, which is Let Me Tell youl A Story. And that's the theme of the book, is the power of storytelling. Tell me why you find storytelling so important.
- [40:02]
E. Jean Carroll
Well, I think, you know, I think back to, I don't know, to when I was growing up. I come from a really big family in rural Mississippi, a really huge extended family. And when we gathered, we, you know, celebrated and ate and drank. But also the older people in my family told stories. And so I grew up around storytellers. I grew up hearing stories of My grandparents. My great grandparents. So, I don't know. I feel like storytelling has always been really important to how I understand myself and to how I understand my community and my family and the people around me.
- [40:44]
Walter Isaacson
Well, let me focus on the great storyteller in your book, which is your grandmother. And she told stories that had a moral purpose to them as well. Just tell me about her. Tell me about sitting on her lap.
- [40:59]
E. Jean Carroll
Yeah, my. So when I speak about my grandmother, I'm speaking about my maternal grandmother, my mom's mom. And I grew up with her. I mean, she was a second, you know. Well, not really a second, I guess a third parental figure for me. I grew up in her household because me and my nuclear family had to live with her for a number of years. She. When she told stories, she was always. It was always important to her that she was telling the whole story, right? Telling the good with the bad. You know, she was. In her stories, they always. There was a serious weight at the center of them, but at the same time that there was a serious weight at the center of them, they were also. Her stories were also funny, you know, they were also full of love and joy and connection. And, you know, she. She did not have an easy life. You know, she did not complete high school. She never graduated. She earned her ged. She worked really hard throughout her life, you know, as a. As a housekeeper and later as a factory worker. But she. But she embraced life.
- [42:33]
Walter Isaacson
Let me quote her from the way you quote her in this book of essays, which is you say, my Dorothy was the first storyteller of my life. One of the most important lessons she taught me about life and story was this. Tell it straight, tell it all. And that what this book of essays has, and your fiction, your novels have it, which is you don't sort of sugarcoat things. And yet there's a core of hope and optimism that comes through.
- [43:04]
E. Jean Carroll
Yeah, I mean, there are two reasons for that. The first reason is because writing in that way is I'm being honest, right. About what I see in my family, in my extended family and in my community. Right. And then the second reason, you know, that I. That it's important to me to be honest in my work in that way is because I feel like, you know, the people who came before me, my parents, my grandparents, my great grandparents, you know, all the. All the people who, you know, who lived in this place and who made me what I am today, they lived. They always. They live their lives that way. Right? They embrace the truth of their lives. And at the Same time, they never lost a sense of hope. They held that close to them. And I think that's what made it possible for them to thrive and not just survive their lives.
- [44:05]
Walter Isaacson
And you talk about survive. And once again, the last sentence of your book repeats the theme you say. You tell stories, you tell their stories, you tell your story, you survive. And so how important is it to the survival that we become a species of storytellers?
- [44:26]
E. Jean Carroll
I mean, I think it's essential because storytelling enables us, I think, to connect the dots in our lives, to curry a sense of meaning in our lives. You know, we also use storytelling to connect to others, and that's really important, too.
- [44:48]
Walter Isaacson
One of the sad things I notice in the book is that she develops Alzheimer's. What do you learn from that? When she can no longer remember the stories.
- [45:05]
E. Jean Carroll
It's heartbreaking, really. You know, she. She was a storyteller. You know, my grandmother was. She had so much knowledge, I think, of my family and of my community and of our history. And so when she began to lose her stories, she. She lost an important part of herself, I think. And, you know, because she is. She's. She. Because she was the first storyteller of my life, because she helped me to learn to see the world through stories and through connections. It was heartbreaking, I think, you know, for me to witness her losing those stories and losing.
- [45:55]
Walter Isaacson
But you feel you're carrying on her work?
- [45:58]
E. Jean Carroll
I hope so. I hope so. You know, she was an exceptional, you know, storyteller, like in person, an oral storyteller. You know, I practice in a different medium, but I don't know, I hope that I'm carrying on her legacy and that I'm making her proud.
- [46:20]
Walter Isaacson
One of the complexities of race you talk about in the book is when your grandmother, Dorothy, goes to visit her white auntie. Tell me about that.
- [46:30]
E. Jean Carroll
Yeah, that's one of the earliest stories that my grandmother told me. You know, as I said, like, she was very intent on telling you the whole truth, but that was one of the early stories that she told me. So, you know, this is the. My family is mixed, I guess. And so she would visit her white, I guess, her grand aunt. So it was her grandmother's sister who was white. And her grandmother, right, was white. And they actually lived up in the kiln in Mississippi, and, you know, which is, you know, right next to Delilah, just sort of north. And they would visit during the daytime, right. And, you know, her white grandmother would go, and then her dad, and then all the kids would sort of pile in the car. But when Sunset approached, her aunt would say, okay, it's time for y' all to go, you know, and that's because
- [47:45]
Walter Isaacson
the kiln was a white community and Delilah was a black community, even though they were abutting each other.
- [47:51]
E. Jean Carroll
Yeah. And so there was there, I mean, that she was concerned for their safety, right. If they were there after, if they were there during the night. And so they would pile back into the car. But you know, my grandmother is a brown skinned woman, you know, and all of her siblings, they were, you know, varying shades of brown. Like you tell that they were mixed. And so they would have to hide in the trunk of the car. And she would always tell me, there's the shirts say, you know, we called it the boot, you know, so we would all have to climb into the trunk of the car and they would close the boot and that's how we would ride back, even though the sun hadn't even set yet. But that's how they would ride back from the kiln to Delille. And my, you know, her grandmother would sit in front and then her father, who was so light skinned that he could pass for white if need be, they would sit in the front.
- [48:44]
Walter Isaacson
This great book which I loved is called On Witness. And, and I know a whole lot of words, but I didn't know the word respair. Tell me about it.
- [48:53]
E. Jean Carroll
I'm sad that I can't actually remember the name of the poet who taught me this word. It was a poet I followed. And in 2020 they were, they made a number of posts about how they were thinking about the word repair and holding that word close to them. And when I read it, I thought, well, I don't even know what respair means. And then they explain what it is it means and that it means to find hope after despair. And it's. I, you know, I think I lit up, you know, like now when I read it, because I thought, oh, it's a real shame that we've lost that word and that we don't have that word. Because now that I know it, it feels like an essential concept, an essential idea. And so I, so I made note of it, right? And so then when I was working on the essay about my partner, my spouse, who died in early 2020, I thought, this is a perfect word to share in this essay.
- [50:04]
Walter Isaacson
When you were young in the library of Mississippi, there was a map of Mississippi writers and it had black and white, it had Richard Wright, it had Eudora Welty, of course, and Faulkner. Now you're on the map in Delisle. But you started reading these people. Let me start, if I can, with Faulkner, because I've got an odd theory about your book which you may push back on, which is Delisle. And all your novels are in this town. It's sort of like your Yakna Pitafa county is to Faulkner. And it's all about storytelling. You have Quentin in Absalom. Absalom sitting at Aunt Rose's feet, listening to the storytelling of it. How much do you think you're similar and how much do you think you're different from Faulkner because you both write about race in these tiny communities?
- [50:56]
E. Jean Carroll
I mean, I think that I definitely sort of modeled this idea of writing about a community, writing about a town, and also fictionalizing, basically, my hometown in my. This area along the Gulf coast, because. Because I read Faulkner and because I saw what he did in his work and how he made that place seem alive and complicated and real. Right. And so, yeah, so I think I definitely modeled my fiction after his. You know, there's this. There's this sense of atmosphere in his work that I think that I'll also try to, I don't know, translate into my own work.
- [51:45]
Walter Isaacson
Your novels, all of them, even Salvage the Bones ends, I think, with hopeful notes. Is that right? And why.
- [51:56]
E. Jean Carroll
I think so. I think all my work. And there's an element of hope, I think, in all of my work. Part of the reason that I think that that is true, and perhaps the most essential reason is because, as I said, I look at my grandmother's life. I look at my great grandparents life when I was growing up, when I was a kid, several of my great grandparents were still alive. And so I look at their lives, and they. Without some sense of hope, you know, without some sense of hope that they could sort of live their way to a better tomorrow and they could help sort of create a better tomorrow. You know, I don't think that they would have. I don't think that they would have survived, you know, Mississippi in the 20s and 30s and 40s and 50s. So I don't know. So I think that, you know, I try to honor that in my creative nonfiction, but in my fiction as well.
- [52:59]
Walter Isaacson
We're about to have our 250th birthday. As a nation, it's time of a lot of despair and a lot of discord. What lessons from poor black community in Mississippi do you have for the nation?
- [53:19]
E. Jean Carroll
Well, I think we have to follow my grandmother Dorothy's lead. I think that we have to
- [53:27]
Ivy Meeropol
tell
- [53:27]
E. Jean Carroll
the whole story, tell the whole truth, you know, even if it makes us uncomfortable. We have to reckon and we have to witness with it all, because that's how we get, I think, to a fuller understanding of who we are and of what we can become. And I think that's how we also still hold onto a sense of hope, especially right now. I think in a moment that for many of us, especially those of us from my neck of the woods, that can feel rather hopeless.
- [54:02]
Walter Isaacson
Jesmyn Ward, thank you so much for joining us.
- [54:05]
E. Jean Carroll
Thank you.
- [54:08]
Bianna Golodryga
And that is it for now. If you ever miss our show, you can find the latest episode shortly after it airs on our podcast. And remember, you can always catch us online on our website and all over social media. Thanks so much for watching and goodbye from New York.
- [54:35]
E. Jean Carroll
From the descendants of history makers involved in the Louisiana Purchase to the Lewis and Clark expedition, discover the untold stories of American expansion in the CNN original series, this Land, premiering June 7th on CNN.
- [54:50]
Craig Ferguson
Hey, I'm Anderson Cooper. On my podcast, All There Is, we explore grief and loss in all its complexities. As Ken Burns said on an earlier podcast, the half life of grief is endless. Mariska Hargitay knows that very well. Jane Mansfield was killed in a car crash in 1967. Mariska was in the car with her. After decades spent coming to terms with her past and wanting to learn more about the mother, she doesn't. Mariska has made a remarkable documentary called My Mom Jane.
- [55:20]
E. Jean Carroll
Our vulnerability is our greatest strength and our greatest connector. And so in telling the story, I don't feel vulnerable. I feel free. We all have a story, and you
- [55:34]
Ivy Meeropol
never know what somebody else carries.
- [55:36]
Craig Ferguson
Talking grief, building community. That's what the podcast is all about. This is all there is. Listen and follow wherever you get your podcasts.