elections or not. >> incredibly important decision ahead for the justices. ben, joan, thanks so much. "cnn this morning" continues right now. ♪ we'll stay forever this way ♪ >> that voice. >> oh, that voice, beautiful voice, beautiful everything, beautiful dress, beautiful woman. >> terrible news. >> it's december 8th, by the way. the reason that we opened up with that showing you celine dion because celine dion is making a heart breaking announcement of a rare medical condition. we're going to have more on that in just a moment. these are the five big things that cnn is following this morning. a chilling new warning from

russian president vladimir putin telling war weary russian citizens to prepare for a longer war in ukraine, his invasion now in its tenth month. putin says russia will fight with, quote, all means available and not ruling out the first use of nuclear weapons. >> also this morning investigators in north carolina are zeroing in on two possible motives for the targeted attack on two energy substations. one involves extremists and the other looks at a series of recent disruptions of lgbtq-plus across the country. >> and a firm of individuals hired by former trump's lawyers searched his property in recent weeks, they found two items marked in classified inside a florida storage unit that has the former president's belongings inside of it.

agents took hundreds of documents from the former president's home. >> and cluster war head munitions are banned by hundreds of countries, are continually banned by countries and now russia wants access. right now, though, gas prices are cheaper than they were one year ago. some needed relief for americans who have spent this year grappling with the worst inflation in decades. for some perspective, a month ago the average cost of a gallon was $3.80. let's bring in chief business correspondent christine romans who knows all about this. good morning to you. >> good morning. >> has inflation peaked in.

>> in terms of gas prices in the near term, yes. you had more than $5 a gallon this summer and we are far from that. 47 cents in the last month has come off of gasoline. if you have an suv and you're filling it up, it's about ten bucks less today than it was last month. that's a noticeable amount here. a couple of things going ahead, some refineries that were offline, had repairs and they're online now. also you had these concerns about covid shutdowns in china. china is using less petroleum. so the whole worldwide market of gas, there's a little bit less demand, concerns about slowing demand next year so futures markets have been a little bit cool. this is all good news for those filling up the gas tank. >> the white house every day is tracking these gas prices. we know that they were getting up at 3 a.m. to check the gas prices. a big question is around diesel.

that is also how goods are transported. that is really key to inflation prices. >> absolutely. gasoline prices are cooling a little faster than diesel prices so those are also showing signs of peaking as well. one of the things that can be sort of the down side of lower gas prices, sometimes they fall because you're worried about a recession. so they're falling for the wrong reasons. they were very low during the pandemic. that's because we were in the middle of a pandemic. you don't want low gas prices because the economy is crashing, right? >> christine romans, we appreciate that. >> nice to see you. >> and we're standing by right now for breaking news. >> announcer: this is cnn breaking news. >> so this is the breaking news right now. we're getting news that brittney griner is free. she's been released in a prisoner swap with arms dealer

victor boot. she is now in u.s. custody. our team of reporters and analysts are standing by. we want to start with kiley atwood at the state department. hello. what do we know at this point? >> brittney griner is now free. she is in the custody of u.s. officials. we're expecting to hear from president biden today, and a source familiar tells us that this was a prisoner swap. it was brittney griner for vick tore boot, an armed drug trafficker, serving a 25-year sentence here in the united states and he's someone the russians have wanted for a while. griner is a very famous basketball star and there's been

an immense amount of public pressure by the biden administration to secure her release. notably we're not hearing there is any news on paul whalen, another american who has been wrongfully detained in russia since 2018, going on four years in russian prison. and so that is notable because u.s. officials have been saying for quite some time now that they were pushing for both britney griner and paul whalen to be released. we can expect it will be an emotional day for paul whalen's family. and of course we're waiting to hear more as to how this all came to fruition. you'll remember that earlier this summer we reported that the biden administration had put an offer on the table with the russians to try and get out brittney griner and paul whalen and viktor boot was part of that

deal. we're seeing part of that deal coming to fruition but not entirely. >> and, kiley, my question on this is obviously this is big reporting that we had over the summer about this offer that the biden administration made for this convicted arms dealer, vi viktor boot. they thought the russians were going to jump on that proposal and the russians did not. it caused serious frustration from the white house, they made it very clear they were frustrated with the fact the russians had not taken them up on that offer. the question about this, we do have big questions about paul whelan but what changed in this? is there any sense of why the russians have now taken the united states up on this offer to get brittney griner and bring her home? >> there was an incredible

frustration from officials because they felt they were offering russia something they really wanted. boot's name came up often between the us and russia but clearly the russians realized there was an incredibly high price on brittney griner. we should note she is a famous basketball player, an american star. she really galvanized the lgbtq community, the african-american community to pressure the biden administration to get her out and rest assured that russia was watching as that happened. of course, paul whalen was part of that conversation but she galvanized the public in a different way when it comes to americans who are detained abroad. >> kiley, before you do more reporting on this, i do have a question. when president biden was asked not that long ago in there were any terms under which he would

engage with vladimir putin directly, the only term was if it had to do with the release of brittney griner. do we know anything about the president's involvement in this in any way because secretary blinken did say the president was briefed every step of the way this summer, remember, before they made this offer in june to russia. >> yeah, that's right. so putin didn't end up showing up at the g-20, which is where we thought potentially biden would see him if there was something to discuss about a prisoner swap so that was sort of off the table. when it comes to president biden's role in all of this, is they have repeatedly said they weren't telling the russians anything was on the table without approval of the highest levels. what that means is that president biden knew everything in terms of what u.s. officials were offering to the russians privately. the russians over the course of the last few months have been

incredibly hard because they have been coming back to the u.s. with proposals that u.s. officials said they could deliver on. clearly they felt like they could deliver on this deal here. >> let's remind people what happened here. this is february 27th when she played for the mercury. she was detained in russia. she was on her way to russia at a moscow airport and there was a substantial in her bag. she was detained for that that contained cannabis oil, vape cartridges. a week later there was the invasion of russia. that added a complication on top of this. so this is all playing out in the backdrop, david. and the timing could not have been worse for her. >> that's absolutely right. and there is of course suspicion that she was grabbed at the airport, obviously it was a week in advance of the invasion, exactly in part, don, because

the russians wanted to grab a hostage and have sort of one more bargaining chip as the war went on. they also wanted to get viktor boot out of prison. he's been there for more than a decade, for a long time. and one of the questions that has been sort of circulating through this whole thing is whether this long-time arms dealer who is considered one of the most dangerous people on earth was worth more -- the united states should insist that they get more than just a single person back in return, particularly somebody who is held wrongfully. so the fact that they didn't get paul whalen as part of this is i think going to be politically a bit difficult for the president. he's the bigger name -- >> we're learning the president is going to speak at 8:30.

>> paul whalen has been in the hospital in recent days in russia. abby, you had that interview we all remember and i understand you've been in touch with cheryl, who is brittney griner's wife? >> yeah. we have been waiting -- they've been waiting for this news for quite some time. what i've been hearing from over there is that they've been waiting for the phone call and that phone call clearly came this morning. the very brief interactions i had with sharrel over the last few hours, her spirits were high this morning. i think you can see why. this has been a long-awaited moment. in the last few months, president biden hosted sharrell griner at the white house. one of the main messages president biden wanted to convey was he was doing everything he

could but did not feel russia was seriously coming to the table. russia was asking for more than the white house believed they could give them in that moment. as we look at what has happened here we're have boot, changed for just one of the two americans who are in the most kind of high profile detention situations in russia, it seems something significant must have changed where russia was willing to come to the table again in a serious way and at least do something. that was not the case a few months ago, at least not according to what the families have been told by president biden and by the white house. but they came out of those meetings feeling like the administration was really putting everything that they could into it and based on the pr president's public statement saying he only wants to talk to putin about this issue is as strong as you can get that this was at the top of the agenda.

>> we are hearing that biden has been on the phone with brittney griner we are told, we believe, that vice president harris was also in the room. obviously there's going to be a lot of steps that happen here. there are a lot of questions about what exactly was part of this transaction. brittney griner is going to have to undergo a medical evaluation. she had been kept in this russian penal colony. could you tell us what she is being released from and what could be putin's thinking on now taking the u.s. up on this offer? >> that's really the question, isn't it? conditions are really severe. i mean, this is located in a region that is really remote. these penal colonies, as they're called have very sparse conditions. they have to do labor, a bad situation. but i think when you ask why

now, obviously viktor boot has been key for russia and all of this depends on the situation by president putin. and viktor boot, even though it been a while, he is an arms dealer and he is very much a prisoner that could be of more value in the time of war because he knows he presumably still has those connections for selling weapons, obtaining weapons, et cetera. i would think that might be useful. and then of course how does this help putin is the ultimate question. does it make him look more magnanimous? i don't think that's probably a major part of this. we'll see what immediately i don't know says. >> if you're juist tuning in, we're getting breaking news that the wnba stars britney gtney gr

is being released from prison. griner and paul whalen's family have been -- >> can i just add that biden gave final approval for the prisoner swap over the past week and he was updated as it was taking place. >> antony blinken had been asked about this on the sunday shows and indicated they were trying to work out a prisoner exchange and now it appears it has come to fruition. let's go to fred pleitgen. it expected this might happen and now it appears it has happened. what are you hearing from the region? >> first of all, we're trying to get in touch with brittney griner's attorney.

the legal team did put up a big fight for brittney griner. they said she was in good spirits. they said they had managed to visit her and she was still in good spirits despite the fact that she was now in this penal colony. the way that the russian legal system works, the way the odds were stacked against her, even the lawyers representing her said the only thing they could really hope for was for a prisoner swap like this to happen. they knew it was going to be something that was going to be very complicated, they knew the russians were playing hard ball, they wanted a high-profile person like viktor boot in return. but they also said they basically exhausted all the means they had within the russian legal process, which is a difficult one anyway and britney brittney griner had already been transferred to that penal colony, in moldova, which have an extremely tough region.

they said they weren't get information from the russian side but they were hoping the prisoner swap would happen. we're going to see if we can get word from them how they feel about all this. one of the things you guys were talking about and we were seeing as well was the russians seemingly becoming more and more open to the swap happening. they are extremely angry at the beginning when the u.s. made public it had put forward a substantial offer and when it came out that viktor boot and griner were part of that, the russians were saying it was counterproductive, they are want everything to happen behind closed doors but wee saw top-level officials coming out and saying they were working behind closed doors. you can see they were setting the stage in the russian public sphere also for something like this to happen. i think you're absolutely right to say that many people were

expecting the swap would happen, not clear when it was going to happen but of course with these things it's all so delicate and so up in the air until the very last moment that it was impossible to tell when this would actually be successful. and certainly i can tell you from the early reactions that i'm getting this brittney griner's legal team is definitely extremely happy she was finally able to get out. they put up a big legal defense for her. they knew the psych lodological trauma she was going through being in that jail so definitely a good moment for him and a great moment for brittney griner and her family. >> we're told that the swap happened at the abu dhabi airport and she's on her way back to u.s. soil again. brittney griner released. >> it's been ten months since she's been held in captivity. >> at 8:30 this morning.

frederi fred frederik pleitgen is on the phone. >> what else have you heard from the white house on this monumental moment? >> if we could put up those photos, this is the photo that the president's twitter account just sent out along with this message that says moments ago i spoke to brittney griner, she is safe, she's on a play, he is on her way home. you can see the expressions of joy on sharelle's face here. this is presumably the moment when he just spoke directly with brittney griner on the phone. it's difficult to overstate what a problem and priority this whole issue had become for

president biden, how much pressure he had come under in recent months, whether it is questions from the media, whether it was from celebrities, including folks in the sports world, family members to get her out of russia and this is why we eventually saw the president meeting in person with griner's wife at the white house earlier this summer. there were obviously lots of conversations and these conversations and the outreach and the efforts really took place at the highest levels of the biden administration. and i have to tell you, you know, obviously the issue of an american being wrongly detained in a foreign country, this is how the u.s. has always described griner's decision in russia, that is always going to be incredibly diplomatically complicated for this president and this situation, take a step back and think about all of this is happening in russia in the middle of russia's invasion of ukraine and this ended up raising so many questions for

president biden and how and whether to engage vladimir putin. in general when he has been asked this question about are you going to talk to him, are you willing to talk to him, he has mostly said, look, i don't want to have a conversation with him unless he is serious about giving signs about wanting to end the war but i thought a really telling moment from earlier this year was in his interview with jake tapper where he was asked would you be willing to have a conversation with putin on the sidelines of the g-20 and he initially said no and then he amended his answer to say i would be willing to do this if he shows signs of being willing to discuss griner. i think that exchange captured how much the groiner issue has been top of his mind and the question of how do you deal with someone like vladimir putin. >> and viktor boot who was supposed to serve 25 years here

has been returned to russia. we hear that he is back on russian soil. brittney griner is on a plane on her way back to the united states. >> let's just pull up for our viewers this photo again. i think it says it all in the oval office. you have the president, secretary blinken, vice president kamala harris. there you have sharrelle, britney's wife embracing the president there. let's go back to the state department. kiley atwood is there. i do think we have to also continue to shine a light on the fact that paul wayland, former u.s. marine, is not part of this deal. and when trevor reed was released, paul wayland said "why was i left behind"? do we know anything about that this morning? >> no. we have heard u.s. figurofficiay

repeatedly that they want brittney griner home and paul whalen home. secretary of state tony blinken was questioned on this pretty directly on a sunday show on cbs and he said the intention of the administration is to bring both of these americans home, but he did not equivocally state they wouldn't be open to a deal if they could get at least one of these americans home and clearly that was the situation they were faced with here. we're obviously looking to learn more about those conversations with the russians if they were simply saying that, you know, now or never in terms of getting brittney griner home. i think it's worth to know there will be an incredible amount of scrutiny on this deal. boot is convicted, serving a 25-year prison sentence in part for conspiring to kill americans. this is a really incredibly bad person. he committed extremely heinous

crimes. when you compare that to what brittney griner did when she was detained and sent to a penal colony in russia, those two things are not the same. rest assure we have heard from other u.s. officials, from trevor reed, another american wrongfully detained in russia and released earlier this year, the biden administration will say they should release victor boot. >> and the russian arms dealer we're reporting he is back on russian soil right now. brittney griner, who has been detained in russia faced nine years. she has been released in a prison swap with the russian

arms dealer. you see president biden expected to speak at the white house at any moment now -- >> one thing to watch. >> stand by for one second. he briefed u.s. officials are telling us this is from our phil mattingly, our chief white house considered. once that happened, biden spoke with griner, griner's wife sharrelle and a second official speaking about this over-the-weekend question on cbs. >> kaitlan. >> i think we should bring in jonathan franks. he has been a critical player in so many of these releases and negotiations. obviously, john, you were a big part of this when it came to

trevor reed. we were talking about paul whalen and what the president has to do. you know what this experience is like behind the scenes, how delicate, how sensitive they are. what can you tell us on your take that brittney griner is coming home but also the fact that paul whalen is not, from our understanding. >> good morning, kaitlan. thanks for having me. congratulations on the new show. i think i am in a place where i am overjoyed for sharrelle griner, who is an incredible person who i would never want to go up against in a courtroom. at the same time, i'm sick to my stomach that the whalens have been left behind. this is at least the third time.

>> i was struck and thank you for joining us, given your expertise on this, we really appreciate it. i was really struck by a lot of folks in your position and a lot of folks, for example, that there is a real risk here. this is the biden administration moving forward, not necessarily in tandem with what the justice department would do. he said the risk is it could in incentivize the grabbing of american residents off the streets. speak to how you weigh those two things, right? >> i don't know how to weigh them properly because i've never been a government official doing it, but i will say i've talked to a ton of experts on this, there's absolutely no empirical evidence whatsoever that making these deals increases hostage

taking. what increases hostage taking is our stubborn unwillingness to impose any costs on the hostage taker. we've got to cause pain for the people who are doing it. >> i just want to report what we're hearing from our sources at the white house and our sources in washington and i quote here and perhaps you can we weigh in on this as well, this is a quote, this is the only deal we can make right now. president joe biden was personally involved and in constant touch with his team and the deal on this. they were trying to give the green light to personally, execute this trade. he said this was the right deal to make at the time but notably this is the only one we could make. so maybe people are wondering why not paul whalen?

do you agree with that? >> i don't know if it's the right one. it is entirely possible this is the only deal that they could get and in which case they had a moral obligation to do it. at the same time you sit and look at paul whalen having been there 1,400-something days, in bad health, in and out of the hospital, it is possible that it was impossible to get him this time. but i guess that doesn't really -- it's cold comfort for the whelan family and i still feel sick to my stomach while being absolutely thrilled for brit brittney griner. as you know, i've been terribly worried for her. >> i wonder if this is hope for the whelan family. >> the russian propaganda is like he's almost the greates spy greatest spy of all time. this may complicate things.

i know that his family is -- we're absolutely overjoyed for the griners. >> let's bring in nick payton walsh. tell us more about viktor boot who was a notorious arms dealer who was convicted and this going to involve commuting his sentence. >> there's an extraordinary disparity between all the denials of moscow about how this man is not one of the largest arms dealers in history, particularly in the 90s and the massive efforts they've put in

to get him back to russia. in the 90s i've seen videos of him with notorious figures in africa and there's been evidence of him being one of the significant figures trading arms in the 2000s, all of which has been denied. we've seen this bid to keep him out of the american hands. the original sting that caught him were dea agents pretending to be colombian rebels, asking him if he could sell weapons that could potentially harm americans. that's what got him in prison. perhaps he knows people close to vladimir putin in his time in africa where maybe they served in africa, too, and maybe the americans wanted to put pressure on him for better information or a global sense of better justice.

here's more of what we know about him. >> he's the lord of war, according to this fictional movie starring nikolas cage. >> warlords and dictators always pay their bills on time. >> despite much evidence, boot has always denied being one of the biggest arms dealer of 90s, fueling civil wars and bolstering moscow's interest but he still never wanted to be a nobody. why do the americans want you so badly? [ inaudible ]. >> go and ask them. go and ask them. i don't know. >> reporter: he gave me his last interview in a thai jail 13 years ago when he denied the worst charges against him. >> this is a lie and justification. and i never supplied arms at all and i especially never had any

deal with al qaeda. >> in a noisy, packed visiting area as he sat behind the glass, the bit i remember most was his mother interrupting. and that he admitted he had worked for the russian government. >> i just want to say now this already. >> have you ever worked for the russian government? >> in the end he was not superhuman and arrested in thailand after a sting operation and he was always just a pilot courier, he insiste, even as he was led into this courtroom. >> viktor boot begins to face american justice. >> the u.s. sting was complex over many months in countries, capturing him offering money to u.s. agents pretending to be colombian terrorists. he was extradited to face a new

york trial for conspiring to kill americans that saw him sen $ to 25 years in prison in a medium security facility in illinois. there he told me in emails he was in good spirits, brushing up on his many languages and in 2019 very glad when his wife and daughter visited but he was slowly getting to the end of his sentence. the biggest mystery about boot was why the u.s. wanted him so fiercely. yes, he had allegedly dealt arms to a lot of bad people across africa in the 90s but that was known and exposed. observers searched for a weightier reason and one that if he had served alongside kremlin insiders. that remains a huge question mark. >> i have to say it's remarkable to say about somebody who is

accused of such diabolical acts, but this is a very intelligent, very charming man with a long list of historic figures globally he's had personal relationships so clearly somebody who was a big player, even though he says he was just a businessman with a lot of aircraft and somebody of enormous value to the russian government, the exact reason for witch still a secret. >> and one of the charges as you noted there, nick, he was convicted off attempting to kill americans. >> thank you very much for that. i want to bring in cnn's van jones. people may just be waking up and tuning in to wnba star brittney griner on a plane back to the united states free, coming home. this, change happened at the abu dhabi airport. you see on your screen a podium at the white house. the president expected to speak. supposed to start at 8:30. he's a little bit late but he's going to speak. we're told there are maybe some

family members there, the president and vice president on the call when this happened in making this decision. what do you make of this? >> this is huge. first of all, that's a decade-defining image when you saw her wife sitting there, kamala harris was there, president is there, such a human image and yet it just shows this president got it done. he cared enough about this individual person to get her home. it was shocking. i think for young americans to see an icon like that snatched, locked up, treated like garbage and just nine years, ten years for bringing some cannabis oil. >> medically prescribed. >> so these are decade-defining images. i guarantee you there will be young people 10, 20, 30 years from now who will remember this moment because she is an icon. it's really, really extraordinary. and people are talking about this other guy, he's so terrible. there's a lot of terrible people in the world, a lot of terrible

in russia. you can't allow a black female icon to be treated like garbage and the u.s. to do nothing about it. >> we have a two-month warning on the president. expect the president at the podium in about two minutes now. >> also, give credit to black women. black women rallied for this, fought for this. it took some of the male athletes getting jammed up. if this was lebron james, you would be shutting down everything. and that is correct. this is a galvanized grass roots movement by black women to rescue a sister in justice. you think about other black women who you've seen in handcuffs, angela davis emerging triumphant, that's this today, a black woman who was chained, shackled, mistreated and when she lands today, it's going to have the eyes of planet earth on her. >> you're reading my mind. so what happens? what does this mean in terms of

the elevating, right, probably the wnba and elevating attention to black women and attention to are -- it is enormous the implications. >> there's going to be a cultural shock wave that goes out. first of all, she never has to touch another basketball. she'll be an icon the rest of her life. but if she does go back on the basketball court, the wnba goes through the roof. i think people waking up, rubbing their eyes, what's going on, you will remember this for decades. >> it's huge and of course the conditions she's been -- >> the president of the united states is entering the room with griner's wife and the president. >> good morning, folks. it is a good morning. moments ago standing together i spoke with brittney griner. she's safe, she's on a plaune, n her way home after being

unjustly detained in russia, held in intolerable circumstances, britney will soon be back in the arms of her loved one and she should have been there all along. we never stopped pushing for her release. it took painstaking and intense negotiations and i want to thank all the hard working public servants across my administration who worked tirelessly to secure her release. i also want to thank the uae for helping us facilitate britney. that's where she landed. these past few months have been hell for britney and her entire family. people all across the country have learned about britney's story, advocated for her release, stood with her throughout this terrible ordeal. i know that support meant a lot to her family. i'm glad to be able to say britney is in good spirits. she's relieved to finally be heading home and the fact

remains that she's lost months of her life, experienced a needless trauma. she deserves space, privacy and time with her loved ones to recover and heal from her time being wrongfully detained. britney is an incop pmparable athlete, two-time u.s. olympic winner for the usa. she showed characteristic grit and incredible integrity. he wrote to me back in july. she didn't ask for special treatment, even though we'd been working on her release from day one. she requested a simple, quote, please don't forget about me and the other american detainees. please do all you can to bring us home. >> we've never forgotten about britney, we've never forgotten about paul whalen.

this was not a choice of which american to bring heome. we brought home trevor reed. and sadly russia is treating paul's case different than britneys and even though we have not secured paul's release, we will never give up. we remain in close touch with paul's family. my thoughts and prayers are with them today. they have to have such mixed emotions today. and i guarantee you. i urge russia to do the same to ensure that paul's health and hugh humane treat are maintained until we can bring them home. i don't want american to be detained one extra day if we can bring them home. dozens of americans are wrongfully detained, many of

whom have been held since before i took office. and today we remember the other americans held hostage and wrongfully detained in russia or anywhere else in the world. reuniting americans with their loved ones remains a priority for my administration, every person in my administration involved in this. we're going to continue to work to bring home every american who continues to endure such an injustice. and we want to prevent any other american families and i strongly urge all americans to take caution and review travel advisories before they travel overseas, which now includes warning of being wrongfully detained by a foreign government. make no mistake about it. this work is not easy. negotiations are always difficult. there are never any guarantees. but it's my job as president of the united states to make the hard calls and protect american citizens everywhere in the world, anywhere in the world. and i'm proud today we have made

one more family whole again. so welcome home, britney. and now i'd like to invite sharelle to say a few words. of course, she's not excited at all about this. it's all yours, kiddo. congratulations again. >> thank you. thank you. >> so over the last nine months you all have been so privy to one of the darkest moments of my life and so today i'm just standing here overwhelmed with emotions but the most important emotion that i have right now is just sincere gratitude for president biden and his entire administration. he just mentioned this work is not easy and it has not been. there as been so many hands involved. i'd like to take a moment to specifically mention a few, vice president harris, secretary blinken, jake sullivan, jess from the national security council, fletcher, shone from

the hostage invoice office, a special thank you to governor richardson and mickey, the mercury players, the wnbpa for your advocacy and also you guys may not know this but my family has been tremendously supported by the washington agency. they've just been amazing for me and mile and my family throughout this process. today my family is whole but as you are all aware, my family is whole. i will say that b.g. and i will remain committed to the work of getting every american home, including paul, whose family is in our hearts today as we celebrate b.g. being home. we do understand there are still people out here who are enduring what i endured the last nine months of missing tremendously their loved one.

so thank you, everybody, for your support. today is just a happy day for me and my family so i'm going to smile right now. thank you. >> thank you all very much. >> reporter: mr. president, what do you say to the whalen family? >> when will britney be back in the u.s.? >> what did you say to the way family who said this is a catastrophe for paul, mr. president? how soon will he be home? >> the president getting bombarded with questions at the end of that conversation. this is a moment that we'll all remember as van jones just alluded to. it is a happy moment for the united states. the president started by thanking everyone involved for their hard work, the uae and poppy pointed out britney is in

good spirits, asked to give her space and time. he said he wrote her back in july -- she wrote him back in july asking for help for her but also for others who had been detained as well. he said it wasn't a choice about what american to bring home, that this was the right move at this time, mentioning pwhelan saying this is not time to give up and said that it was a priority for the united states to bring them home and he would do that britney's wife said people around the world witnessed them in the darkest moments of their life and she said this has not been easy. she thanked tony blinken and she said today my family is whole and b.g. and i will remain

committed to bringing people home as well. abby philip has been involved in interviewing the wife of brittney griner. she is happy. it's an amazing moment for her. talk to us about your clf conversations. >> i've spoken to cherel many times over the last several months. she is overjoyed by this moment. it's been incredibly difficult. t for reasons as you can imagine, this for the families is unbearable. in this case it was clear to cherelle, i think she feared what would happen to a black lesbian woman in russia, what would happen in the context of the ukraine war, how russia could seek to use brittney

griner to meet other ends in the global sort of conflicts that were unfolding. so it's a huge relief but as you can see there, there is a lot of i think on the other side of it, you know, guilt is probably not the best word but a feeling of sadness for the other families, especially for the whelan family, who she's gotten to know over these last few months. when i first met sharrel, it was in a setting where she was being really embraced by this community of families of wrongfully detained americans who basically took her under their wing and the first thing that they told her was that she needed to continue to pressure as loudly as possible the biden administration, asking for a face-to-face meeting with president biden, which she did publicly in her interview with me until she got that meeting that public pressure, a lot of people around these issues have really changed the paradigm around wrongfully detained americans around the

world. it's really put it front and center. it used to be that administrations wanted to deal with these issues totally in private but i think the griner family, sharrelle and the wnba made this front page news for months and months and months and i thisnk they believe that madea huge difference, making it impossible for president biden to do anything else but make with the pressure on the white house that came from these families. with trevor reed's family, they came out in front of the white house, powering raining. they stood out there because they wanted the attention. >> can i ask you, though, because you're the chief white house correspondent. you were in the rooms, asking those questions when these things happened. what struck you about what we just heard from the president? >> i think he really wanted to talk about what a happy moment

this is, and that's incredibly a big focus here of what this means. cherelle griner saying these have been the darkest moments of my entire life where they couldn't speak, couldn't talk to her. also saying paul whelan's family, we hear you and saying -- we'll wait to learn more about what officials say when they brief reporters. totally illegitimate reasons that russia is not releasing paul whelan at this time. m.j. lee, you're at the white house, you were watching the remarks from president biden. it was the moment at the end when kristen welker shouted out the timeline. he said he believes brittney griner will be back in the united states within the next 24 hours. obviously she veal to undergo a medical evaluation, but president biden making clear what a monumental moment this is. >> reporter: absolutely. this speech was first and foremost celebratory talking about how greiner has been through hell, the president said, over the last few months and now able to be reunited with

her family. when he let cherelle griner take the podium, even before she let out any words, she let out a huge sigh of relief and said i'm just overcome with emotion. you hit the nail on the head. he made sure the speech was also in large part about addressing paul whelan. he said we have not forgotten about him, we're not giving up and we're going to keep negotiating in good faith. i just want to give you a little bit of our reporting from the morning on sort of the backstory of why paul whelan wasn't included in this deal, a u.s. official telling me that they have, of course, been trying for months to make sure brittney griner and paul whelan were part of this deal. this is what they ultimately wanted. the russians made clear as we got into the recent days that they were only willing to negotiate for griner. they essentially treated the two cases very separately based on the different things that each person was accused of. the u.s. administration kept

pushing for whelan to be a part of this deal, but ultimately they got to a point where the russians made it so clear that he could not be a mpart of this deal, that they were only willing to give up brittney griner. they ultimately had to make the decision to accept this deal, this official telling me, quote, it was a choice to get griner or nothing. a different senior administration official told me this morning this is the only deal we could make right now. the question now is, look, if victor boot wasn't enough for paul whelan, what is going to be enough? that is going to be the problem and the discussion that is certainly already on going in the administration because obviously they wanted both of these people. they were not able to get both. we heard directly again from the president, emphasizing repeatedly that it is a top priority for him now, to turn his attention to whelan and getting him out of russia. >> absolutely. m.j., thank you very, very much for all that reporting and especially that context at the end. now we'll bring in david whelan,

paul's brother. david, good morning to you. thank you for being here. >> morning. >> let's begin with your reaction to the news. >> it's great news. any time an american comes home, it's wonderful news. i'm so glat for brittany and cherelle. it's a wonderful day. >> powell has been held for four years. the last i read and heard from you about a week ago he was in a russian hospital. the president said he's talked to you, as i understand, yesterday. can you share what you can with us in terms of this administration's efforts to get your brother home. >> someone from the white house let us know, which was very kind. it's hard to process this in realtime which is what we had to do last april when paul was left behind before and trevor reed came home. it's a great day for families of the wrongfully detained and we feel wonderful for them, but we do worry about what's in paul's future. it's become clear that the u.s. doesn't have any concessions that the russian government

wants for paul, so i'm not really sure what the future holds. >> listen, i imagine it's bittersweet -- i don't know if that's the right term -- because you're happy for brittney griner's family, her wife and all involved. you said it's a great deal for all people wrongfully detained, but yet your brother is still there. how do you navigate that? what do you think moving forward your conversations with the administration and those who are involved in trying to get your brother home, where does that go from here? >> it's the same thing we've been doing every day for the last 440 days. we heard the news yesterday. i prepared my media statement to go out this morning and we were back to work, checking russians media, looking for options that we could send on to the u.s. government, suggestions. really it's a matter of helping paul to survive until and if the u.s. government is able to find a concession that the russian government wants. it's not magic. it's just a ton of work. >> david, you heard the

president say for reasons he says are totally illegitimate, russia is not treating the release of your brother the same as brittney griner. did anyone from the administration tell you what they believe those reasons are? >> it's not clear to me what it is. probably something to do with parity. russian officials are particularly focused on parity, on getting equal things. if they labeled paul as a spierks maybe they're waiting until the u.s. government captures a spy and offer that as a trade. that's the only thing i can imagine. it's hard to know. it's clear that whatever it is, the u.s. government doesn't currently have it. >> you were alerted before, right? how soon were you alerted? >> it was really gracious of the white house. they let us know yesterday. it's hard to process all of this. last time i was processing it on media an hour after we had learned. it's very difficult to go through those emotions.

>> we are all thinking about you. we don't know what it's like to be in your shoes, but you're in our hearts this morning. >> thank you. cnn's van jones is sitting in. you've been watching all of this and absorbing it. looking at each other from across the desk here, sort of taking in the moment. this is one of those moments you and i cover a lot of breaking news and big stories, we will remember this moment. >> yeah. i think you can see there's this kind of fraternity or sorority of pain. even when cherelle, the wife steps forward, she's talking about whelan. she's not just talking about herself. first of all, what a class act. she thanked everybody. she went through a list of everybody who has ever helped, class act, maintains that poise. she wouldn't leave that microphone without talking about the other people left behind. there's a fraternity and sorority of people who have loved ones held in horrible conditions. we don't think about them every day. they think about them every minute that. solidarity has not been broken.

i think that his brother, also, class act. the first thing he says is i'm happy for the other family. you can see the heartbreak. you can see the pain. his brother has been left behind repeatedly, but he still sticks up for the one coming home. we need to be like that as a country. if they can stand together in this much pain, we should be doing the same thing. today is going to be a joyful moment. for all the pain, all the criticisms, a joyful moment for the black women who led a movement to get one of their sisters home. this was a grassroots movement. they had to push to get male athletes, to get us to take it seriously, but they are triumphed. here is the deal, if you can bring one home, you can bring two home. i don't think it's a bad sign for paul whelan. >> i think i would be remiss if he didn't mention, also, the importance this plays for the lgbtq community.

>> glaad releasing a statement saying they're happy, showing the struggles and dangers that members of the lgbtq community face around the world. when you look at what is happening with the lgbtq community specifically here in the united states, what does this say -- does this bring attention to that and shows us, hey, look, we're all americans. >> brittney griner represents everything in this country. she's female, she's lgbtq, she's black, and she is extraordinary. she's excellent. she's an icon. she's done everything they can do in her sport and yet she still doesn't safe. she was snatched off a plane and treated like trash. we didn't let it stand. americans came together. i think biden and kamala harris, this is one of the things i think they'll be the most proud of. i think americans can stand

together on this one. when she comes off that plane, when she walks off that plane, when her wife hugs her, when that moment happens, that is going to be decade defining. people will remember that. it should show us what we can do when we stand together, show what we can do when we don't give up on too many people. we give up on each over in politics all the time, blocking people on facebook and twitter. we get so mad and let go of each other's hands. you grab hold of each other and look what happens. >> her life will never be the same again. >> and, by the way, if she ever touches another basketball on the court, the whole world will watch, and that will transform women's sports. >> van, thank you. glad you were here with us. >> such important perspective on such big news. cnn special coverage of this monumental, the release of brittney griner now on her way back to the united states continues right now.