Loading summary
Transcript40 lines
- [00:05]
A
Good morning. It's Monday, November 3rd. I'm Shamita Basu. This is Apple News today. On today's show, more signs of military escalation toward Venezuela as Republicans voice dissent. Afghans who helped US Troops are now stuck in limbo in Qatar and the New York City Marathon's photo finish. But first, it's being seen as the first major electoral test of President Trump's second term. On Tuesday, millions of Americans head to the polls for statewide elections. Trump is not on any ballots, but both parties will be looking for signs of voter sentiment one year out from the midterms. Let's take a few minutes to bring you up to speed on the various campaigns and talk about what to look out for as the results come in. Let's start in New Jersey. Over the weekend, President Obama made a last minute appearance for Democratic gubernatorial nominee Mikey Sherrill.
- [01:06]
B
You've got a candidate for governor who's a proven fighter, who's got a track record of getting stuff done. Somebody who sees you and knows your struggles and will work for you every single day. New Jersey is time to point America in a better direction by electing Mikey Sherrill as your next governor.
- [01:33]
A
Her opponent, Republican Jack Cittarelli, said the state needed change in a Fox interview late last week.
- [01:40]
B
We've got a property tax crisis all across the state. Young people can't get started, seniors can't retire here. So listen, there's a lot of opportunity. Some person recently said to me, Jack, I can't think of a worse time to be governor. I said, are you kidding me? I can't think of a better time because it's time to hit the reset button.
- [01:56]
A
It appears to be a tight race for a typically blue state. Cheryl has pushed Chitterelli's links to Trump hard in the campaign, running ads that say MAGA is coming for New Jersey. Chittarelli, meanwhile, has tried to cast Cheryl as a political insider and remote from the state while portraying himself as a lifelong Jersey guy. The winning strategy could offer clues for national campaigners considering how to pitch candidates in tight districts. The other thing to watch out for is the Latino vote. New Jersey turned out for Trump in surprisingly large numbers, and a lot of that was down to his strength in more diverse areas. Latinos will be crucial to success at the midterms, and Tuesday will be the first time we'll get a chance to see if that enthusiasm has held up across the Hudson. And a very different race will perhaps offer as many questions as answers for the Democrats. Zahran Mamdani remains the firm favorite to become the next mayor of New York City against independent Andrew Cuomo and Republican challenger Curtis Sliwa. Over 700,000 people have cast their ballots already, which makes it the highest early in person turnout ever for a non presidential election in New York. CBS's director of election analytics looked into some of the neighborhoods showing high voter counts.
- [03:11]
C
We see places like Bushwick, Williamsburg, Greenpoint and even Long Island City up here that have been much higher than expected. These are places that in the primary were very friendly territory for Mamdani.
- [03:25]
B
His campaign is probably looking at the.
- [03:27]
C
Early turnout numbers and feeling like they're on track to do well on Tuesday If Mamdani wins.
- [03:32]
A
Trump has vowed to withhold federal funding and suggested deploying the National Guard. As for the Democrats, their leadership has shown only lukewarm support for their candidate, even in the final days. When asked by CNN over the weekend if Mamdani was the future of the party, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries replied no. Now, by contrast, the Democrat leading the gubernatorial race in Virginia has run a much more reserved campaign. According to npr, Abigail Spanberger has held a consistent lead over Republican challenger winsome Earl Sears throughout, and the Washington Post reports that she's worked hard to present herself as a moderate candidate. The Post reports that Earl Sears has targeted Spanberger over transgender rights issues, but that it doesn't appear to have made much impact in the way many say it did in 2024. Megan Messerly, a White House correspondent for Politico, told the Playbook podcast that for all of these races, affordability had become the number one issue that she says could be the major takeaway. We've seen some really interesting polling on the economy and prices and the role that's playing in voters decision making in these two races, and I think that really foreshadows, you know, what we're going to see in the midterm elections, right, where we're expecting prices in the economy to remain central issues longer term. Perhaps the most important vote on Tuesday is one that won't deliver any winning candidates. Californians will vote on Prop 50, which would change the way they draw their electoral maps. In governor Gavin Newsom's retaliatory move against recent redistricting efforts in Texas, US Military action in the Caribbean has escalated. On Saturday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed the 15th known strike against boats in the region since early September, killing three and bringing the death total to at least 64. The administration says it's part of their efforts to curtail drug smuggling and hegseth tied the latest target to an unnamed terrorist organization. As military action has crept up and up, so too have the calls for information from lawmakers. But. But over the weekend, reports emerged that a DOJ official told Congress there was no obligation for President Trump to seek their approval for further strikes. The official said Trump was not bound by a decades old war powers law designated to curtail the President's power to commit US forces. Under the law, there would be a 60 day limit from when Trump informed Congress of the first strike to when he would require congressional support for continued military action. That deadline would have been today. On Sunday, Trump spoke to Norah O' Donnell for CBS's 60 Minutes. On Venezuela in particular, are Maduro's days as president numbered?
- [06:26]
B
I would say yeah, I think so, yeah.
- [06:28]
A
And this issue of potential land strikes in Venezuela, is that true?
- [06:32]
B
I don't tell you that. I mean, I'm not saying it's true or untrue, but I, you know, I wouldn't.
- [06:36]
A
Why would you?
- [06:37]
B
I wouldn't be inclined to say that I would do that.
- [06:39]
A
Trump has repeatedly said he doesn't need congressional approval to continue striking boats, but approved closed door briefings. Many lawmakers left one that was given last week dissatisfied. CNN quotes Democrats as furious that Defense Department lawyers weren't present to answer questions about the legality of the strikes. And a growing number of Republicans have expressed dissent. Republican Senators Mike Rounds, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Thom Tillis have all called for greater accountability. And here was Senator Rand Paul on NBC a few weeks ago.
- [07:12]
B
If they want all out war where we kill anybody and everybody that is in the country of Venezuela or coming out, that has to have a declaration of war. It's something that is not pretty, very expensive. And I'm not in favor of declaring war on Venezuela. But the Congress should vote.
- [07:28]
A
Not only does a vote look unlikely, but over the weekend several outlets reported that Hegseth has barred military officials from even discussing the strikes with Congress without prior Pentagon approval. Meanwhile, Trump has also ordered an aircraft carrier to the Caribbean, a move that has raised eyebrows for the amount of firepower a ship of that size has. Here's Dan Lamoth, who covers the military for the Washington Post.
- [07:54]
D
It carries dozens of fighter jets on it. It's a floating city. It's got in excess of 5,000 US troops on it. There's all kinds of different ways you can project force from it. If you're simply going to be taking out a handful of speedboats per week, you don't need an aircraft carrier for.
- [08:10]
A
That this also came up in 60 minutes last night. Why do we need an aircraft carrier and strike group out?
- [08:16]
B
It's gotta be somewhere.
- [08:18]
A
Okay.
- [08:19]
B
It's a big one.
- [08:21]
A
It leads to the suggestion that the United States military is planning a larger operation involving Venezuela.
- [08:26]
B
Well, we're not going to allow countries from. Well, you know, it's countries from all over the world coming in.
- [08:33]
A
Lamoth told us that the ambiguity in all of this has left big questions about the U.S. s endgame in the region.
- [08:40]
D
People have wondered about regime change in Venezuela or Colombia or both. One possibility here is that they are staging all of this firepower in hopes that they might be able to get Maduro to simply leave before there's any kind of incursion or invasion or at least a strike campaign on land. And we simply don't know where that's going yet.
- [09:00]
A
Lamoth pointed out Trump promised on the campaign trail that the US Won't get involved in any new wars. The. But all this saber rattling in the Caribbean leaves open the possibility for more U.S. involvement.
- [09:12]
D
If the United States is going to do any kind of operation in Venezuela, one question I would have is how long would it go? And the problem is, even if they want it to be short duration, if it doesn't go according to plan, then what? At what point do you get dragged in, whether you want to or.
- [09:38]
A
Right now, there are more than a thousand Afghans stuck at a military base in Qatar, living in limbo. Unusually, they're under direct US Custody, and many had been in the process of relocating here. But now no one seems to know what's going to happen to them or when they'll get to see their families again. Robbie Grammer is a national security reporter with the Wall Street Journal.
- [10:01]
C
The United States won't let them leave the camp for security reasons. The Qatari government doesn't want them dispersing throughout Qatar. And so they're just sitting in this camp surrounded by barbed wire fence for months, even years, and they have no end in sight.
- [10:15]
A
Back in 2021, the US airlifted tens of thousands of Afghans from the country as the Taliban returned to power. And pathways to the US Were set up for those most at risk of Taliban retribution. But President Trump has ended those pathways. And now many fear that those at the Qatari camp could soon be heading back to Afghanistan.
- [10:35]
C
And what that would mean is that they have a target on their back. The Taliban sees them fly back in. They say, you've been hosted by the US government. It's clear that you were helping the US against us in this 20 year war.
- [10:47]
A
Officials say that is not the policy at this stage, but there's no sign of them being admitted into the US either. An estimated 300 people at the camp have had applications to enter the US rejected because of security concerns, inaccurate information on applications, or a lack of proper documentation, according to the journal. Grammer spoke to Mohammad Ibrahim, who'd been working for over a decade with the US military in Afghanistan. He spent three years in the country hiding from the Taliban. Following the US's withdrawal in early January of this year, Ibrahim was flown to Qatar under the impression that he would eventually be allowed to go on to the US.
- [11:26]
C
He made it there on January 16, and of course, four days later, Donald Trump took office. He cut off the flow of refugees. He stymied the flow of Afghans into the United States. And so since then, since January, he has been stuck with part of his family in this camp in the Qatari desert.
- [11:46]
A
Four of Ibrahim's children and his sister made it out of Afghanistan, but Ibrahim, his wife, and two of his daughters did not. Two of the daughters are twins and one is living in the Qatari camp while the other has settled with family in Seattle.
- [12:00]
C
These twins talk to each other every night on WhatsApp. They cry together. They share their secrets. But they've been split apart for four years. And it's clear that the twin who's in Seattle, she feels a lot of guilt about the life that she is able to have that her sister can't have.
- [12:17]
A
President Trump has promised, in his words, to take care of the Afghans who helped the war effort. But despite a recent bipartisan push for action, they are are few signs that the situation for Abraham and others like him will improve anytime soon. Before we let you go, a few other stories we're following. Travelers are starting to feel the pinch of the government shutdown as staffing shortages hit major hubs ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday. Heading into the weekend, the Faa reported nearly 80% of air traffic controllers missed work. At New York area, air controllers are currently not being paid. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told CBS he expected it to get worse.
- [13:05]
B
They're confronted with a decision, do I put food on my kids table, do I put gas in the car, do I pay my rent? Or do I go to work and not get paid? And they're making decisions, duffy said.
- [13:15]
A
Safety has also been a big concern during the staffing shortage. On Friday, two planes at New York's LaGuardia Airport collided on the tarmac. There were no reports of injuries. US Energy Secretary Chris Wright says there will be no mushroom clouds in the skies over Nevada nuclear testing sites. Last week, President Trump surprised the defense community by ordering the Pentagon to start testing nuclear weapons decades after the last U.S. nuclear explosion. But Wright told Fox yesterday that these would be systems tests only. Dropping the bomb for testing is now relatively rare, and Wright said the renewed systems testing has already begun as the US Updates its stockpile with newer versions. And finally, the New York City Marathon ended in dramatic fashion on Sunday, as the top two men's competitors crossed the line. In a photo finish, Benson Kipruto from Kenya edged out his countryman Alexander Matisso Munow by three hundredths of a second. Both men finished with a time of 2 hours, 8 minutes and 9 seconds. It's the closest finish in the race's history on either side. It was also the first time the race was decided by less than a second in either the men's or women's event. Kipper Trudeau said in a press conference he knew it would be tight, but was happy to win his fourth major marathon. Sunday was also a sweep for Kenya. On the women's side, Helen Oberi shattered the course record by more than two minutes, finishing at 2 hours, 19 minutes and 51 seconds. You can find all these stories and more in the Apple News app. And if you're already listening in the News app right now, we've got a narrated article coming up next. The Hollywood Reporter has the story of David Ozer, a producer who was once well regarded in the industry with a list of big projects on the way. Oser, however, now sits in a federal prison for fraud, leaving his former colleagues and clients confused as to where it all went wrong. If you're listening in the podcast app, follow Apple News Narrated to find that story and I'll be back with the news tomorrow.
- [15:23]
B
Sam.