Read Full Transcript EXPAND
BIANNA GOLODRYGA, ANCHOR: Hello everyone and welcome to “Amanpour.” Here’s what’s coming up.
ISOBEL YEUNG, CORRESPONDENT: So, three to 4 percent more —
DR. ANIDULLAH SAMIM, NANGARHAR REGIONAL HOSPITAL: Rise —
YEUNG: — babies are dying since the U.S. —
DR. SAMIM: Yes. Yes.
GOLODRYGA: Millions lose a vital lifeline. Isobel Yeung’s special report from Afghanistan on the deadly cost of USAID cuts.
Then —
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The American people. Republicans, Independents, Democrats want the Epstein files released.
GOLODRYGA: — is Trump losing control? I ask the Bulwark senior reporter Will Sommer, how the Jeffrey Epstein case is fracturing the president’s
MAGA following. Also, ahead —
KEVIN DE LIBAN, LAWYER AND FOUNDER, TECHTONIC JUSTICE: The real fraud is that you would design a system to cut people off benefits.
GOLODRYGA: The war over healthcare. Lawyer Kevin De Liban tells Hari Sen how he’s fighting for low-income families on the frontlines.
Welcome to the program everyone. I’m Bianna Golodryga in New York, sitting in for Christiane Amanpour.
USAID has officially closed its doors, but the devastating impact of its loss is echoing around the world. Health clinics and soup kitchens are
shutting down. Hospitals running out of medicine. And food meant for starving people is being destroyed, that’s according to former officials at
the agency. The Trump administration says it’s all in the name of cutting, waste, fraud, and abuse. A highly contested claim.
Among those worst hit is Afghanistan, which received over 40 percent of its humanitarian support from the United States. American donation is
considered a moral duty following two decades of war and a chaotic withdrawal from Kabul four years ago.
Now, the U.S. has canceled $1.7 billion worth of aid contracts, of which $500 million had yet to be dispersed. And to make matters worse, other
countries like the U.K., France, and Germany followed suit, gutting their own foreign aid budgets.
The Trump administration claims that no lives have been lost as a result of USAID cuts. But one study predicts that if the cuts continue through 2030
14 million people could die as a result, that’s according to the medical Journal, The Lancet
And in Afghanistan, it’s not hard to find evidence of how this is already materializing as Isobel Yeung saw for herself. And a warning, parts of this
report are distressing to watch.
ISOBEL YEUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): We are in Afghanistan where the Taliban have consolidated their power, and it looks like they’re here
to stay. But since the U.S. and its allies withdrew and the Taliban took over, Afghanistan’s economy has collapsed. Financial hardships have
impacted everyone, even those dreaming of their big day.
YEUNG: Wow. This is a massive wedding.
YEUNG (voice-over): Everyone here is making the best of their situation, but weddings like these are usually reserved for just one couple. Today,
it’s dozens.
YEUNG: So, many people showing up today to celebrate 80 couples tying the knot. And a bit of a bittersweet occasion, I think, because although
there’s a lot of joy in the room, the reason that they’re having these group weddings is because the economy in Afghanistan is doing really,
really badly. And so, this is all a bit of a cost cutting exercise.
Congratulations.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
YEUNG: How are you feeling today?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I am — I have a great feeling today. It was my great aim to experience this day.
DR. MOHAMMAD BAQIR SAYEER, WEDDING ORGANIZER: More than 70 percent of Afghanistan is living in a poverty.
YEUNG: Right. Because traditionally, Afghan weddings are very big, very expensive.
DR. SAYEER: Yes, it is. Traditionally, it’s big. That kind of wedding party is not suitable for us today.
YEUNG (voice-over): Economic hardship is what makes weddings like this necessary. A fact that’s impossible to separate both from the oppressive
Taliban regime as well as decisions made in America.
The scenes of America’s chaotic departure under President Biden in 2021 are difficult to forget. But even since then, the U.S. has been responsible for
almost half Afghanistan’s humanitarian aid. Now, things have changed.
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: We give Afghanistan about $2 or $2.5 billion dollars year. Do you know that? For aid, aid. We need aid ourself.
YEUNG (voice-over): Earlier this year, Elon Musk took a chainsaw to U.S. government spending. And President Trump’s administration then cut almost
all USAID going to Afghanistan, over $1.7 billion in aid contracts suddenly terminated. 500 million of that yet to be dispersed.
REP. BRAD SHERMAN (D-CA): Has anyone in the world died because of what Elon Musk did?
MARCO RUBIO, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: Listen —
SHERMAN: Yes or no? Reclaiming my time. If you won’t answer, that’s a loud answer.
RUBIO: No one has died because of USAID.
YEUNG (voice-over): Other countries like the U.K., Germany, and France have also cut back. So, what happens to a nation when aid are suddenly
gone? We are here to find out.
Most Afghans live in rural areas, where 20 years of war with America and its allies was most fierce, and where foreign aid has been critical.
YEUNG: The clinic we’re actually heading towards was, until just a few months ago, funded by the U.S. government. Now, the Trump administration
has pulled the funding. A lot of people in this area are left with not even basic healthcare facilities.
YEUNG (voice-over): The U.N. estimates that an Afghan woman dies every two hours from pregnancy or childbirth. This clinic has now closed.
YEUNG: So, this is where women were giving birth?
SAMIRA SAYED RAHMAN, ADVOCACY DIRECTOR, SAVE THE CHILDREN AFGHANISTAN: Yes. You know, this is the only clinic in this area, and now it’s gone.
YEUNG: Afghanistan has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world, right? What happens to these women now that the delivery room is
gone?
RAHMAN: It means that these communities don’t have access. It means that women are going to be giving birth at home, meaning more and more children
are going to die during childbirth.
YEUNG: We were just talking to the community leaders who were telling us that seven people have died since this clinic closed. And just a couple
days ago, a woman died in childbirth because there was nowhere for her to give birth.
YEUNG (voice-over): The woman’s neighbors and family told us that if the clinic had still been open and she’d had the support of a midwife she
would’ve survived. Across Afghanistan, over 400 clinics of closed because of U.S. aid cuts. Millions of people were reliant on these clinics for
healthcare. Now, their only option is to travel hours, sometimes days to public hospitals like this where there’s an influx of new patients.
The U.S. was funding doctors, nurses, and essential drugs here, but now that’s also gone.
YEUNG: Salam. How are you?
DR. ANIDULLAH SAMIM, NANGARHAR REGIONAL HOSPITAL: This has the capacity for just one baby. And we have under ours three babies here.
YEUNG: Yes, it’s crowded.
DR. SAMIM: Yes. Yes. Crowded. Yes.
YEUNG: Is this normal?
DR. SAMIM: Normal? Not normal. When they cut the aid here, our mortality rate, about 3 or 4 percent.
YEUNG: So, 3 to 4 percent more —
DR. SAMIM: Rise —
YEUNG: — babies are dying since the U.S. —
DR. SAMIM: Yes, yes.
YEUNG: Wow.
YEUNG (voice-over): Malnutrition has soared here. 9.5 million people are severely food insecure. Several NGOs previously funded by the U.S. are now
turning away many people in desperate need of food.
Mohamed Omar (ph) has severe malnutrition and meningitis. The family are poor, and were only recently able to bring him the long distance to this
hospital.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): When did he become like this?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): Early in the morning.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): You said it was diarrhea at first and then it got worse.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): Yes, it started with diarrhea.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Since when has he not been able to eat?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): It has been a long time since he could eat on his own.
YEUNG: Hi. I’m so sorry for what you’re going through. Can I ask what your name is?
NAZOGUL (through translator): My name is Nazogul. He’s my grandson.
YEUNG: How old is he?
NAZOGUL (through translator): He just turned one.
YEUNG: What is his situation? What is the doctor said?
NAZOGUL (through translator): Doctors say that a microbe has infected his brain. He’s unconscious now. You can see that the child’s condition is very
bad.
YEUNG (voice-over): In the middle of speaking, we looked over and realized the child had stopped breathing.
YEUNG: Is he breathing?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sorry
YEUNG: Is he breathing?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He needs to go.
YEUNG: He needs to go. So, I move. Move, move.
He died?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
YEUNG: Oh, my God.
YEUNG (voice-over): Mohamed’s (ph) mother returns to the room and the most devastating news.
YEUNG: This is just one family of so many thousands of families that are having to live through this, and it’s utterly heart wrenchingly
devastating.
YEUNG (voice-over): It’s impossible to definitively blame one single factor for Mohamed’s (ph) death. He was suffering from a range of serious
illnesses. But aid cuts have dealt a devastating blow here.
Counseling aid to Afghanistan has long been a goal for Congressman Tim Burchett.
REP. TIM BURCHETT (R-TN): 5 billion in cash.
YEUNG (voice-over): Claiming $5 billion U.S. taxpayer dollars have gone directly to the ruling Taliban, a designated terrorist group. But the U.S.
government’s own watchdog says it’s more like 11 million. The vast majority of money goes to those it’s intended for.
YEUNG: Are you intentionally misleading the American public when it comes to inflating these figures so that you can get what you want?
BURCHETT: No, ma’am. I’m not. As a matter of fact, $11 million is still a whole lot of money to the average American. If it’s one penny going to the
Taliban, they’ll hate us for free.
YEUNG: What would you say to — I mean, there are millions of Afghans who are going to be affected by this.
BURCHETT: I would say, you’re going to have to make it on your own.
YEUNG: Hundreds of clinics across the country have now closed down. I literally watched a baby die from malnutrition. What would you say to these
families who are living through desperate circumstances devastated by the results of your actions?
BURCHETT: I think it’s horrific, but it’s not due to my actions, ma’am. We don’t have any more money. We’re borrowing that money. And again —
YEUNG: But it is due to your actions. I mean, you have been advocating for this for the last couple of years.
BURCHETT: These are people — no, ma’am. No ma’am. It’s not our response. We have Americans in the same position. We have Americans that are having
trouble with childbirth. We have Americans going hungry. And you want us to borrow money and send it overseas?
YEUNG: Is there not any moral responsibility given that, you know, the U.S. did fight a 20-year war there?
BURCHETT: You know, ma’am, my responsibility is to my own country and to the district I represent.
YEUNG (voice-over): With the U.S. turning away, the fate of Afghans is now left in the hands of their own government, the Taliban, who say they’re
capable of running the country without foreign aid. They denied our requests for an interview.
Ruling with an iron fist, the group have increased their surveillance, making it difficult for anyone to speak critically. Whenever someone tried
with us, they were abruptly cut off by a minder lurking behind our camera.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): Since the Taliban came, the entire economy has been weak.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is not our topic.
YEUNG: Wait, we’re talking. Why are people trying to stop you talking? She’s allowed. What is the issue?
Like what are you saying?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, you don’t take that message.
YEUNG: Just — please just let him please — just let him, please. Please. You are telling him what to say.
The Taliban obviously have a very tight grip on the situation here. A lot of restrictions, particularly for women and girls. And to be honest, even
operating as a journalist here is incredibly difficult right now. We know that the Taliban has been tracking our every movement. The GDI have
frequently been checking up on us. There’s even a directive issued, which means that you are not technically allowed to take any photos or videos of
living beings. And so, operating freely here is really, really difficult.
YEUNG (voice-over): With our every move being watched, we spoke secretly on secure lines to many people across the country. Women especially told us
their lives are now at risk, both from U.S. funding cuts as well as strict Taliban laws, meaning they can’t travel alone even when they have urgent
medical needs.
This is the voice of one woman.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): There’s no longer a clinic near us. And women can’t leave home without a male chaperon. My babies who were
miscarried were full-term, and I had to delivery them. They were twins.
YEUNG (voice-over): For 20 years, Afghan women and children were promised progress, but they now live under a Taliban regime that stands accused of
carrying out gender apartheid. Basic rights like leaving the house and going to school have been stripped away from Afghan women and girls. Their
options are increasingly limited.
YEUNG: What are you studying?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): Holy Quran.
YEUNG: So, here in the Taliban’s Afghanistan, they are still not allowing girls over the age of 12 to attend school in a modern sense. Until
recently, USAID had been funding a series of secret schools across the country for girls to attend. But obviously, that funding is now dried up.
So, one of the only options for girls is to attend these madrasas, these religious schools, where predominantly the focus is on learning a very
strict interpretation of Islamic rules and Islamic principles.
Hi. How are you? You are cramming for exams right now?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, sure.
YEUNG: And how old are you guys? How old are you?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I’m 17.
YEUNG: You’re 17?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She’s — I’m 14.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I’m 16.
YEUNG: OK. And you’re all in the same class?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. All in the same class.
YEUNG: OK. What do you want to be when you grow up?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have a lot of dreams. I want — either I want to be a surgeon or a translator. I like languages and also like doctors.
YEUNG: So, if you want to be a surgeon, what are your options?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Abroad gets. No options here.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want — I wanted to be a doctor in the future. But when Taliban came to Afghanistan, all the doors of the schools closed.
YEUNG: Will you stay in Afghanistan?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want to stay. I love my country. I want to stay here forever, but like I do also want to study.
YEUNG: Do you think the U.S. has abandoned Afghan girls and Afghan women?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Kind of. Kind of.
YEUNG (voice-over): We wanted to speak with the principal of the madrasa, a longtime supporter of the Taliban. He sees nothing wrong with the status
of women’s rights or girls’ education in Afghanistan.
YEUNG: So, many of these girls have so many hopes, so many big dreams. How can they hope to achieve them when so much of the curriculum is about
learning religious studies, and they’re not able to go on to higher education to college because the Taliban forbids that?
SHAFLULLAH DILAWAR, MADRASA PRINCIPAL (through translator): I reject the idea that the Taliba imposed restrictions on girls to prevent them from
studying.
YEUNG: Because the Taliban have given you the curriculum, what a lot of people who might be watching this will think is that these girls, bright as
they, are being brainwashed into the Taliban’s ideology and the Taliban is weaponizing education here.
DILAWAR (through translator): The students are very happy with our environment, our curriculum, and us. There were some problems in the
curriculum. The curriculum that was set in the madrasa is very beneficial for the role of mothers in society so they can raise good children.
YEUNG (voice-over): Perhaps more than anyone, this generation of young Afghan girls are living under a Taliban regime that seeks to largely erase
them from all forms of public life. Like so many others, now abandoned by those who once came to their aid.
GOLODRYGA: And to note that the U.S. State Department did not respond to a request for comment. For more on her powerful reporting and her findings,
Isobel Yeung is now joining me from London. And again, just echoing that sentiment, Isobel, such a thoughtful, important, depressing, heartbreaking
and eye-opening piece of reporting and journalism. So, thank you so much for how delicately you handled that.
Where to begin? I guess the death of Mohamed (ph). And to see that little boy in the hospital, obviously it moved you to tears. Hard not to be
emotionally gutted when you are standing there and witnessing the death of a child from meningitis and malnutrition, and you rightly note that there’s
no way to directly link his death with the cutting of USAID.
But from what the doctor had seen and has seen, the uptick in maternal mortality rates and children coming in in similar conditions, what did you
learn?
YEUNG (on camera): Yes. Hi, Bianna. I mean, as you said, just completely heartbreaking, difficult not to be impacted by what we were seeing there. I
mean, I recently became a mother myself and just watching this woman come in and realize that her child was dead and just crumpled to the floor and
realized that — I mean, this is just every parent’s worst nightmare really.
But what, you know, one doctor told us there was he literally pointed out for other children who he said were also likely to die in the next few
months because their family were not able to get the food they needed. They were not able to get the treatment they needed. They’re not able to get the
resources they needed. These doctors and nurses are completely overwhelmed by the situation there.
You know, NGOs that we spoke to said that millions of Afghans are likely to be impacted. We spoke to many families across the country who were really
struggling with very primitive concerns, trying to figure out how they’re going to feed their children, how they’re going to treat their children if
they get sick, when they take them to these clinics, and there’s just not the resources there anymore now that this aid has been pulled.
And this is just one aspect of it. You got to remember that, you know, the emergency food has been cut, that, you know, women’s work programs have
been cut, that demining efforts have been cut, that psychological support has been cut. So, this really is a complete wholesale destruction of the
aid from the U.S. that was going to Afghanistan.
GOLODRYGA: And as we noted, obviously the majority of this funding was coming from the United States, but compounding to that is that other
nations now have also cut back in their aid, focusing more on their own domestic challenges. The U.K. obviously just recently saying that they also
will be cutting in aid internationally and increasing their own defense spending.
That cumulatively is having a massive impact on Afghanistan. Talk about what you learned from those cuts.
YEUNG: Yes. I mean, as I said, it’s really is this wholesale destruction. We’ve seen that, you know, so many different programs impacting so many
different parts of life that, you know, basic healthcare people are no longer able to access. But I mean, you’ve got to also remember the context
of Afghanistan is that the Taliban are ruling under this authoritarian regime. And what many in the International Community have called gender
apartheid.
So, girls over the age of 12 are no longer able to attend school. Women are not able to leave their home without a male guardian. They’re not able to
travel. They’re not able to go to parks. They’re not able to, you know, raise their voices in public. So, there’s so much that has been impacted
here. And so, what we are hearing again and again from speaking to people across the country is that women and children are particularly vulnerable
and they’ve been extremely impacted by these cuts.
You know, one of the last loopholes that I think was left for some girls was these, you know, online education programs, overseas scholarships,
secret schools that were up till now being funded by the U.S. And now, that sort of last glimmer of hope has now been pulled from underneath them. And
so, a lot of girls that we spoke to were really struggling to see what their future prospects were in Afghanistan.
GOLODRYGA: And to see those girls in madrasa instead of medical schools, and I was really moved by one of those girls — first of all of them
speaking perfect English, saying, I want to, I wanted to be a doctor. The generational impact of this in life under Taliban rule and the gender
apartheid is massive and the longer-term implications are yet to be determined, but none of it good obviously for Afghanistan or the world.
Here you have a generation before them that was much more open, much more advanced, and had much more freedoms than the generation that followed.
What stood out to you the most? I mean, just hearing them say that they felt abandoned is really what touched me.
YEUNG: Yes. I mean, this is — it really depends where you are in Afghanistan. But you know, particularly in Kabul, there was this generation
of Afghan girls, Afghan women who were, you know, promised freedoms and promised, you know, future education and promised work, et cetera. And now,
a lot of those doors have been closed.
You know, we saw a lot of those girls say to us that they didn’t feel like their futures were in Afghanistan. And I think that sentiment was echoed
over and over again. Anyone who was able to leave the country to seek, you know, further education, to seek work was trying to do that because their
options are so limited within Afghanistan itself.
GOLODRYGA: And to know how brave they were to be able to speak so openly to you. You also documented how those minders were interfering with some of
your reporting and the fact that they knew that the head of the school was there with them and they still chose to speak their truth. Really, really
powerful and important reporting. Isobel Yeung, thank you so much for bringing it to us.
YEUNG: Thanks, Bianna.
GOLODRYGA: And later in the program, all eyes are on President Trump as the frenzy of the so-called Epstein files refuses to die down. How MAGA and
the White House are reacting to the scandal That’s next.
GOLODRYGA: Next to the House of Representatives where Speaker Mike Johnson is sending members home early until September, denying them the chance to
take a symbolic vote on releasing files related to Jeffrey Epstein. It’s an effort to control a spiraling crisis.
For years, members of Trump’s MAGA base have latched down to the scandal surrounding the disgraced financier and sex offender, claiming the
existence of a secret client list. Now, his followers have a new target for questioning Trump himself as suspicion builds over his broken promise to
release details about Epstein.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: His administration has lost a tremendous amount of goodwill with voters because people care viscerally about the Epstein
files.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That we were told was new information on Epstein, it wasn’t. We were told that more information was coming, there wasn’t. You
claimed that you had the list on your desk, you didn’t. And none of it came out.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I mean, look, at the end of the day, we were promised one thing and we have not received that promise.
GOLODRYGA: Will Sommer has studied the intersection of conspiracies in MAGA for years, and he joins me now from Washington, D.C. Will, it is good
to see you. And this is perhaps one of the first scandals of the second term that will not go away for President Trump.
As we saw, the house speaker who just weeks ago was saying these files — or days ago actually, saying these files should be released now saying that
Congress is going to be adjourning early for an August recess to a avoid this discharge petition that some Republicans are also now pushing forward.
Talk about the threat this poses to the administration, to the president himself.
I mean, just moments ago he started blaming and deflecting back to 2016 election interference, blaming all President Obama of treason, trying to
really pivot this and turn it into a democratic crisis and conflict. Is it working?
WILL SOMMER, SENIOR REPORTER, THE BULWARK AND AUTHOR, “TRUST THE PLAN”: No, I mean, I think the president is in a real quagmire here. I mean, we’re
entering now the third week of this scandal. You may remember it all began with this Justice Department memo closing the case, and then the president
said, well, we’ve just got to move on. I don’t want to ask any questions. He insulted his own supporters when they asked questions about it.
And now, the administration is pivoting. They’re trying to meet with Jeffrey Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell, as though that’s supposed to
reveal something. You know. It’s a real mess for the president and he keeps kind of throwing out these distractions saying, you know, Obama should be
prosecuted for treason. All of this kind of smokescreens. But I mean, to be frank, even his own supporters are seeing through it.
GOLODRYGA: And not only that, but another attempt to deflect from this scandal is by releasing the JFK files and the assassination documents
surrounding it, some 6,000 documents, 250,000 pat pages. The family says they didn’t have much notice at all. The administration says that this is a
move towards transparency. This is something that they promised to do. They also promised to release the Epstein files.
And Martin Luther King Jr.’s daughter, Bernice King, responded to this by writing on X, now, do the Epstein files. So, talk about the pressure on the
president and why Epstein specifically out of all scandals, out of all controversies, why this is the one that’s sticking?
SOMMER: Yes, the administration’s really in a quandary here. Everything they do, the response is, OK. Well, what about the Epstein files? You know,
the — Pam Bondi released the — or maybe to Tulsi Gabbard released the MLK assassination files nearly 60 years old yesterday. And as you said, I mean,
they were say — the response really was, OK, but like, what about the far more pressing Epstein case?
You know, it’s a tough one. I think the Epstein case is particularly resonant with Trump supporters. For years they were led to believe, I
think, without a lot of evidence, that a lot of high-profile Democrats were on this possibly mythical client list. J. D. Vance, Kash Patel, Dan
Bongino, all these people who are now in the administration, they said, oh, my gosh, we got to get this client list. The government’s holding it, if
only they would release it.
And so, MAGA has put a lot of hope onto this client list. And now, suddenly, you know, particularly The Wall Street Journal reporting —
revealing more about Donald Trump’s ties to Epstein, the administration saying, oh, my gosh, we got to move on. I mean, Mike Johnson shutting down
the House early. I mean, it’s basically unprecedented to prevent this Epstein vote. I mean, it’s really remarkable. And Republicans can’t really,
at the moment, figure a way out.
GOLODRYGA: You mentioned J. D. Vance, we also talked about Mike Johnson just a few weeks ago, seemingly defying even the president by saying, yes,
these files should be released, now doing a full 180, saying no, no, no, we’re going to go to August recess early.
J. D. Vance also just a few months ago said the same. Here is J. D. Vance, the vice president, right now, who is also calling for these files to be
released and made public.
J. D. VANCE, THEN-U.S. SENATE REPUBLICAN: Seriously, we need to release the Epstein list, that is an important thing.
GOLODRYGA: That was right before the election, we should note, last November. October 22nd was the date of that interview on a podcast. Now,
he’s coming back around and criticizing The Wall Street Journal. I guess this is another way to deflect, to sort of blame the media for all of this.
But can you give us the backstory. As someone who has covered these conspiracy theories and why so many people in this administration, the
president himself has pedaled in these conspiracy theories for years, why Epstein in this scandal has a bit more legs to it than some of the others?
SOMMER: Sure. I mean, so Jeffrey Epstein did have ties to some prominent Democrats, including Bill Clinton. And so, as a result, Republicans really
zeroed in on it. And they thought — particularly after Epstein’s mysterious death in 2019, they thought, OK. you know, this is something
that’s happening that we can really latch onto and get even maybe apolitical people interested in, because you’re talking about this alleged
kind of international child trafficking sex network.
But really, what’s happened is it’s sort of boomeranged back on the administration. Senate — Democratic Senator Dick Durbin says that he heard
that FBI agents reviewing the files for release were told to flag examples times Trump was mentioned in the files. It’s not clear if that’s true. What
happened to those files where Trump was mentioned?
So, it seems like there was this real rush in the administration to release the files. Pam Bondi gave the famous binders that turned out to be kind of
a debacle of previously public information. And then, suddenly, the administration says, no, no. It’s over.
And so, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to wonder, did they find something they didn’t like, that they didn’t want to release or what changed? And
that really has put the spotlight on Trump.
GOLODRYGA: Can you tell our viewers about the relationship? Again, we don’t have that much time, but Trump’s close ties directly with Jeffrey
Epstein dating back decades. They severed ties. There was a falling out between the two. Trump has not been accused of any wrongdoing. But just the
relationship itself seems to be really making the president nervous or wanting to deflect and change the topic.
SOMMER: Yes. I mean, Trump and Epstein knew each other for over a decade. They ran in these kind of wealthy New York circles. And I think along with
The Wall Street Journal article where he — where they covered a letter he sort of — a friendly letter or, you know, perhaps more, perhaps a coded
letter that Trump allegedly wrote to Epstein, there’s also, we know that Trump gave this quote in 2002 in a New York magazine profile of Epstein
that said, you know, Epstein really likes women, some of them very young.
You know, in a way that seemed to imply, given the later pedophile charges against Epstein, that maybe Trump knew something about Epstein’s
predilections.
GOLODRYGA: A body letter is how The Wall Street Journal is describing it. And the fact that the president is now trying to not only go after
Democrats and put the blame squarely with the Democrats saying that they were the ones who were associated with Epstein, but for the first time,
he’s coming out here and really bashing his own base, calling them stupid, those that continue to peddle in these conspiracy theories and also those
that are pushing for the files to be made public. How much does he risk by going after his own base so directly?
SOMMER: Yes. I mean, I think the president here it’s a moment we maybe have rarely ever seen him in where he’s at odds with his own base. I mean,
he called them stupid, he called them weaklings. He said he doesn’t want anyone’s support if they’re still interested in the Epstein case or asking
questions about what happened or if there’s a coverup.
And so, it’s a moment where, you know. I think for those who have observed the president’s political instincts for a while and have seen that Trump
has a lot of ability to maintain this tie with his base in the face of so many other scandals, it feels like there’s something going on that’s
throwing him off.
And I think there has been backlash from his supporters who are saying, you told us for years this was going to be a big thing, and now all of a
sudden, you’re insulting us for asking questions?
GOLODRYGA: But still, we should note it is a minority of his supporters that are speaking out directly against him. He still carries enormous
weight and support among Republicans and the MAGA base as a whole. But this does seem to be one of those situations where those who peddled in
conspiracy theories and were railing against the establishment, find themselves actually being the establishment.
And now, are in a position of either saying, there’s nothing to see here, which seems to be one argument. And the other narrative is that maybe
there’s something they’re hiding. Is there anything he can do at this point to make this go away, to make this base that’s so demanding of more
information at ease with, OK. you know, we’ve seen what we need to see, time to move on?
SOMMER: I mean, I think it’s really challenging. I think clearly the administration is trying to unseal some of the grand jury testimony in the
Ghislaine — or in the Epstein case. The judge — right before we started talking here, the judge basically said he’s not going to make that easy for
them to do. He’s demanding more answers. And that’s only a small fraction of the total evidence that the administration now seems to have no interest
in releasing.
So, it seems as though perhaps they’re trying to do what we might call a limited hangout to release some information, but not all of it and hope
that people move on. But I mean, look, the House Republicans, clearly, some amount of them, want these files to come out if Mike Johnson has to close
the House early. So, this is an issue I think that is growing within the Republican.
GOLODRYGA: How does this differ from the Access Hollywood tapes, which some viewed at the time as a career ender and that obviously wasn’t the
case? Can this be viewed any different?
SOMMER: I think it’s much more complicated for Trump. I mean, certainly I think we all expected it would be a career ender for Trump to access
Hollywood tape. But you know, he’s weathered that and so many other scandals. But this is unique. It’s about the sexual abuse of children in
the Epstein case.
I think there are a lot of like legal questions and sort of complicated issues regarding files. And, you know, who knows what could come out. I
think people didn’t expect that this reported letter, you know, of a nude woman that Trump allegedly sent to Epstein, who imagined that would come
out? And so, I think there are a lot of potential shoes that could still drop. So, it’s difficult for the administration to get ahead of it.
GOLODRYGA: And now, the president suing The Wall Street Journal and actually not allowing its reporter to travel with him, the administration’s
blocking the reporter from traveling to a trip to the Scotland that the president is taking.
Will, just in these final few seconds, if there’s something that you’ll be watching closely now over the next few days that will determine the staying
power of the scandal, what is it?
SOMMER: Well, the deputy attorney general said today that he’s going to meet with Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s associate. She’s facing 20 years in
prison. I think she has a lot of incentive to cooperate with the administration and potentially kind of say whatever they want her to say.
And so, Ghislaine Maxwell, whatever she says, she’s been subpoenaed to speak to Congress as well. I think all eyes are on her right now.
GOLODRYGA: We’ll be watching closely as this continues to unfold and surprise by the day. Will Sommer, thank you so much for your reporting. We
really appreciate it.
SOMMER: Thanks for having me.
GOLODRYGA: And still to come for us, the Trump administration plans to roll out Medicaid work requirements nationwide. Some states have already
tried it. How Arkansas’s 2018 implementation of this policy could serve as a cautionary tale for what’s to come. That’s after the break.
GOLODRYGA: Well, millions of Americans are at risk of losing their healthcare coverage, all because of President Trump’s domestic policy law,
which mandates work requirements for Medicaid benefits nationwide.
A similar policy was implemented in Arkansas seven years ago. And having seen how damaging it can be on low-income and disabled residents, lawyer
and founder of nonprofit TechTonic Justice, Kevin De Liban the case against the state in 2019 to overturn the rules. and he speaks to Hari Sreenivasan
about his recent New York Times op-ed on this topic.
HARI SREENIVASAN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Bianna, thanks Kevin De Liban, thanks so much for joining us. You wrote an op-ed recently called,
“We Saw Medicaid Work Requirements Up Close. You Don’t Want This Chaos.” What is the relevance of Medicaid work requirements in Arkansas and how
does that translate into what might and what likely will happen in the rest of the United States?
KEVIN DE LIBAN, LAWYER AND FOUNDER, TECHTONIC JUSTICE: Well, thank you so much, Hari. Back in 2018, Arkansas was the first state to ever implement
work requirements for the Medicaid program, and what we saw is mass coverage losses of 18,000 people losing coverage in only five months of the
work requirements with many more threatened if they had continued. We were able to put a stop to them through the court process and lawsuits.
But now, what’s happened in the reconciliation bill is the Republicans have mandated that every state implement these draconian cuts, which are going
to boot millions of people off of Medicaid, make them less healthy, cause chaos to their health systems and social services systems, and just end up
in widespread disaster and chaos.
SREENIVASAN: OK. So, let’s assume the steel man defense for a second, for the other side. The people who wanted to propose this in Arkansas and are
doing this for the rest of the country they’re thinking — their best-case thinking is, listen, we want to cut down fraud, waste, abuse. That’s the
famous slogan. But they also — they say, look, we want to encourage people back to work. We don’t think that it’s onerous to say that if you are, you
know, able bodied, that you should have to contribute something to our economy to be able to get some of these benefits. What’s wrong with that
thinking, or at least how it was implemented in Arkansas?
DE LIBAN: Well, first of all, 92 percent of Medicaid beneficiaries already work, have caregiving responsibilities, go to school or have disabilities.
So, there’s actually no problem here. The real fraud is that you would design a system to cut people off benefits in mass scales. We’re talking
millions and millions of people and force them to be less healthy so that they’re less able to work, less able to participate in community and less
able to do the things that we all want out of a kind of a decent life.
Now, there were studies done in Arkansas that showed that the work requirements — these penalties did nothing to actually increase
employment. In fact, they were correlated with a decrease in employment. And that’s for obvious reasons, right? People need to be healthy in order
to be able to work, right?
Think about low wage workers. You think of gas station attendance, certified nursing assistants who work in nursing facilities or in people’s
homes, restaurant servers or dishwashers or line cooks, landscapers, day laborers, all of these jobs require immense physical exertion, right? You
have to be on your feet all day. You have to lift things and lift people. If you are not healthy, if you have untreated arthritis or a back sprain or
ankle or wrist problem, you’re not going to be able to do this work.
And so, these penalties have it all backwards. If you have Medicaid, you can go get the treatment you need to be healthy so that you can work and
otherwise kind of participate fully in community, in the life that we all want for ourselves.
SREENIVASAN: So, look, the supporters of these measures would say, I’m not trying to kick the people off who are legitimately there, but I just want
to document this, right? I mean, I’ve created websites where someone can go in and submit their proof work. What’s so difficult? Why is the paperwork
onerous? Have there been kind of studies that looked at the layer of bureaucracy and what that does in terms of kicking people off who deserve
the care?
DE LIBAN: Yes, basically you’re buried under avalanches of paperwork. So, this is what happened in Arkansas, right, and these are disingenuous people
offering disingenuous points. The way that people lose coverage is because they can’t end up complying with this unnavigable process to establish that
you’re already doing what the program says you should continue to be eligible for, which is work or volunteer or take care of other people or
whatnot.
And so, for example, in Arkansas, I was a legal aid attorney. So, I helped hundreds of people, my team and I helped hundreds of people directly try to
maintain their eligibility and thousands more through community education efforts. So, first you don’t even necessarily know if you’re on the type of
Medicaid that is subject to the work requirements. Because in many states, Medicaid is not called Medicaid, it’s called something else.
In Arkansas, it was like Arkansas Choices or Arkansas Home or Arkansas Works or various other names. So, you don’t even know if this applies to
you in the first place. If it does apply to you, you might get 10-page letters that are indecipherable even to somebody like myself who’s a
lawyer, right, and has practiced law, really hard to understand.
If you try to call to get more information about what the letter’s actually saying or what you have to do, you’ll end up waiting on the phone
oftentimes for hours. And even if you get through to somebody, they might not provide you relevant information that you need to comply. Then maybe
you’ve done it, right. Maybe you’ve gone through and completed the website and thought you did what you had to do to keep coverage, but no, that was
only good for one month and you have to do it every month, or you got an exemption that said you’re good for two months, but now, you have to
remember in the third month to go back and sign on.
If you didn’t log in the last 30 days, you’re locked out of your account automatically and then you have to call somebody to go ahead and get
permission, basically reset on their side so that you can enter the website again.
In Arkansas’s case, the website closed every day at 9:00 p.m. So, you just have these floods of bureaucracy, of paperwork, of red tape that you have
to jump through. And Republicans very well know, any proponent of work of these penalties knows that folks will not be able to jump through all the
hoops, and that they’ll get tripped up and that they’ll lose coverage. And that’s what justifies the cost savings, is it’s that you’re kicking people
off coverage.
SREENIVASAN: When somebody says, oh, 18,000 people in Arkansas, it sometimes becomes an abstraction. In your op-ed, you wrote about an
individual named Adrian McGonigal. Tell us a little bit about his story.
DE LIBAN: So, when we met Adrian, I think was in his late 30, right around 40. He had just gotten his best ever paying job working at a poultry plant
in northwest Arkansas. And it paid better than a lot of the low wage, minimum wage jobs that he had before. And he was working OK and he reported
his work requirement compliance as was required.
Then suddenly he goes — and he goes to the pharmacy and is told that he has to pay for his medicines for his chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder
or COPD. The pharmacist — Adrian asked why, I have Medicaid. The pharmacist said, no, you don’t. You’ve been cut off. So, Adrian walked out
that day without his COPD medications. Sure enough. His COPD, which he’d struggled with for many years, kicked in. He ended up in the hospital
multiple times in a short timeframe.
The employer tried to accommodate him for what they could, but eventually, he missed so much time that the employer had to let him go. He didn’t get
his insurance back until we at Legal Aid of Arkansas stepped in and got it back, but by that time it was too late. His job was lost, his health had
worsened. And for the next several years he would struggle amongst various minimum wage jobs, never ever returning to kind of the level of income that
he had under the job at the poultry plant. And very, very sadly, Adrian passed away last November.
So, this is just one example, Hari, of the real-life consequences of these penalties is. Mr. McGonigal, Adrian was working, he was doing everything he
should have been doing. He still lost coverage. He lost his health, he lost his job, and he was never able to recover or have any hope at a — you
know, at a more economically prosperous life because of that coverage loss.
SREENIVASAN: What’s wrong with this kind of blanket you broad brush to sort of paint these people out to be, you know, moochers that are seeping
off the system?
DE LIBAN: It’s really sad to me, because I’ve worked with low-income people my whole life. People are doing the best they can with what they’ve
got. These myths and stereotypes that demonize poor people don’t account for the reality that almost everybody is working, taking care of family
members, going to school, has a disability, and is really doing the best that they can with what they’ve got to eke out a meager existence.
I can tell you, Hari, the social safety net in the United States is meager. People don’t get cash benefits. People might get a little bit of money in
food stamps, but you try feeding a family on $6 or $7 per day, right? People get Medicaid coverage that, again, is only useful to go get medical
treatment that you need that allows you to continue working. So, it is a very difficult, precarious existence to be a low-income person in America.
SREENIVASAN: Kevin, tell me a little bit about the cost benefits here. Is the benefit of the — you know, kicking these people off Medicaid, is it
worth the cost of setting up the infrastructure to try to do this in the first place?
DE LIBAN: So, in Arkansas, I think the total was 24, 26 million spent. In Georgia, it was in the hundreds of millions. Estimates for how it was going
to be deployed. It Kentucky was, in the hundreds of millions. So, yes, it’s going to cost hundreds of millions of dollars for states to pay to private
contractors, and that to me is an abject failure of — you know, of morality, and it’s an abject failure of good policy, to your point about
kind of the cost benefit analysis, there is no benefit to this.
What you’re doing is you’re making people poorer, less employable. You’re making it so that the employers in your state have a less reliable, less
healthy workforce. You’re making it so that the hospitals in your state are more likely to close, especially if they’re in rural areas and absorb more
uncompensated care. You’re overwhelming your state social services and you’re taxing your own state case workers who oftentimes are devoted public
servants, but working in very hard conditions.
And so, there really isn’t any material benefit to these programs other than cutting people off, in this case, to save money to justify tax cuts
for the richest Americans and buddies of, you know, the people who are proposing these laws.
SREENIVASAN: You know, look, someone watching this, they’re going to quote the White House website, which I’ll say here, as the president has said
numerous times, there will be no cuts to Medicaid. You know, the one big beautiful bill removes illegal aliens, enforces work requirements and
protects Medicaid for the truly vulnerable. Are these cuts?
DE LIBAN: Absolutely, these are cuts, right? The only way that you get the kind of savings that is required by the reconciliation process is if you
cut people from Medicaid, and all estimates are that the reconciliation bill is going to cut up to kind of 17 million people out of kind of health
insurance through Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act subsidy program.
And so, you’re going to have more and more people be uninsured, more and more people getting treatment from emergency rooms, which is more costly,
people being crushed under medical debt and all the, you know, adverse kind of consequences to society, whether it’s hospitals or social services or
state workers or Medicaid providers or other people that just aren’t going to be able to survive in this kind of new paradigm. So, these are cuts and
they’re cuts all around.
SREENIVASAN: I want to ask about another hat that you wear as the founder of TechTonic Justice. And it’s a new undertaking to try to fight the
impacts of artificial intelligence on low-income communities. And just for our audience, kind of what have you found so far in how A.I. is part of the
decision-making that could impact whether or not somebody qualifies for whether it’s Medicaid or SNAP benefits or social security, or lots of other
parts of the safety net?
DE LIBAN: Yes. So, first of all, A.I. is coming for all of us. And it’s being used by government agencies, landlords, employers, other people with
power to make decisions about the core life areas of all of us, but particularly low-income people. So, where we work, how we live, how much
rent we pay what benefits we get, the nature of whether medical treatments are approved or not. All of these things are being decided right now by
powerful people using A.I.
And all 92 million low-income people in the U.S., that’s people kind of within eye shot of poverty, 200 percent of the federal poverty line, have
some key aspect of their life decided by A.I. Now, almost always, this ends up being harmful, right? People lose access to benefits. Their housing
opportunities become restricted, rents go up, job opportunities go down. And when you’re hurt by artificial intelligence-based decision making, you
really have nowhere to turn to help you kind of assert your rights.
And so, TechTonic Justice is an effort from various experiences I had as a legal aid attorney in Arkansas to recognize that this is a real threat to
the wellbeing of all of us, but particularly low-income people. And so, that we start now devising strategies and investing resources into fighting
back against these forms of injustice that are really tricky, that you don’t know that A.I. is being used. If you do know A.I. is being used, you
don’t know how it works or why it works that way or how to fight back.
And so, TechTonic is meant to try to help us fight against this kind of impending threat to, you know, justice everywhere.
SREENIVASAN: Kevin De Liban, thanks for joining us.
DE LIBAN: Thanks so much, Hari.
GOLODRYGA: And finally, a unique stress therapy that is all the rage.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pulling in 3, 2, 1.
GOLODRYGA: Scream Club Chicago is bringing people together each week to let it all out into Lake Michigan. Before yelling at the top of their lungs
participants join in breathing exercises, write down what they want to release on biodegradable paper, and then throw it into the peaceful waves.
A ritual of strangers hoping to walk into the sunset, feeling just a little bit lighter. Be honest. You want to join them, right? Sounds very
cathartic.
Also, make sure to tune into tomorrow’s show where we’ll cover a landmark climate case brought to the U.N.’s top court by the Pacific Island Nation
of Vanuatu. At the center is the question, should nations be held accountable for their pollution and impact of the natural world? More on
that tomorrow with the Island’s climate minister who will be joining Christiane from The Hague.
Meantime, that is it for us 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.
Thank you so much for watching, and goodbye from New York.
END