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tv   CNN News Central  CNN  September 18, 2023 8:00am-9:00am PDT

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physically touching him, but after his father was a hostage and his father taken custody at the airport, a couple of weeks they came in and told him that his father had died of a heart attack, and told him that they could not let him out to bury him, and then came back a week later to say, they lie and he is okay. >> how is the family today? >> extraordinary. to imagine them all being able to hug for first time. we didn't know if emad sharghi would be alive. even the iranian government's own doctors felt compelled to let him out, because they were afraid to let him go, because they were afraid that he could not leave because his sentence was commuted, and now that he is
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85 years old and to stay alive now to reach this moment to hug his son in freedom and to reunited with his family. >> and seeing your emotion coming through on this, it is showing real, the humanity of all of this in the mix of obviously this so complicated politics. i am looking at the statement, and it is a lengthy statement. >> of course it is. he has been waiting a long time to say it. >> he has a lot to say. >> yes. >> and he will have a lot the say going forward. and that is one thing in this, it is not what has happened to me since, but it is a call to now, and speaking directly to president biden, as i take my first breath of freedom, will you engage with world leaders and engage at a endeavor to prevent taking hostages in the first place. and talk to me about what his
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mission is now that he is now having his first breaths of freedom. >> well, i think that is this is his mission, because he has been and he will be a case study example of the worst of an american detained somewhere in the world because of how many times he and his father were left behind by democratic and republicans. no difference of barack obama and donald trump, and siamak and emad were detained at the end of the obama administration and trump administration, and siamak the same, and yjoe akim the sam and i would engage president biden to say that he is going to say that state-sponsored hostage
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taking be outlawed as a practice. the reason they do it is because it is profitable. you have to wait, and eventually, it will be paid out. it is a logical and reasonable and rational thing to do, and the only way to do it is if 30 or 40 or 50 countries around the world say, we will take an attack on one as attack on all, and if one hostage is taken, dozens or 50 or 60 countries will take action against the hostage taker, and the cost could outweigh the benefit, and the hostage takers would have to reconsider their perspective. but we have been doing pit the same way since 1979 in our country's history and we have to change it in a big and dramatic way. >> and those conversations are the most meaningfulb, and jared, do you have a view of when siamak and his mother and the
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entire family will be reunited once again? >> well, they are going to be reunited in the washington, d.c., area after a 15 or 16-hour flight to doha and so very, very late tonight east coast time. i do want to say something about effie namazi whose story could not be told, who is a loyal wife and mother, and she stayed there when her husband was out of jail, and she could go to abroad, but she refused to leave until siamak could leave, ab she stayed there years and years until this day came, and she could leave the country with her son, and she has been through as a mother is beyond what anybody can imagine as a mother and wifeb and she is the silent hero of the family who held them together through this extraordinarily difficult times. >> there is little more that needs to be said after that,
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especially when you think of so many times that this was not a guaranteed ending of how this was going to go for the five americans especially for siamak after all of the years that he was imprisoned. again, he continues to give you chills when you hear what we are looking, and when you are hearing what you are saying and seeing the pictures of them finally landing in doha. jared genser. thank you. >> what an extraordinary interview and extraordinary man who clearly feels that he is part of the family working on this for 7 1/2 years. >> you can hear the emotion and the exhaustion of the small army of people who have been working tirelessly to make it happen. >> what did you find? i found the that phone calls after he was in house arrest, he had a cell phone that he could facetime. >> small phones and the regime allowed them to have the smart phones and make facetime calls afterwards to the families and jared as we know. and siamak in the actual
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statement did call out and thank what he called superstar lawyer jared, because he has stuck with this for years and he has been unpopular for rattling cages, and his motivation for his own client probably helped the others as well, because he would not let it go. so, i think that it is an amazing time how so many people got together to make sure that the people would not be forgotten, because face it, it was not that easy to do this. there was a lot of opportunity for administrations not to take the hard decisions. and then in the end, this administration did. and let's not forget that we keep talk about should we/shouldn't we? america has done the deals with north korea and russia and all of the axis countries that are, you know, the engage in this kind of the commercialization of human life. >> we have an announcement from mike pence who is running for president, and he going to
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criticize the unfreezing of iranian funds. >> and when i asked jared genser about that, and why criticizing, because he and the administration went into a similar prisoner swap twice. they left siamak twice, and why? that is the question. that is the question. >> and john kirby said today when i asked him, what happens when they are of course criticizing and david sanger is here to join in the conversation, and the reason that the criticism comes from is that you are handing the way it is depicted is that it is $6 billion that you are handing over so they can continue to fund terrorism, et cetera, et cetera around the world. and what john kirby said today, if this money is seen to be, and it is going to be used for not humanitarian purposes, the tran action ends, because of the structure of the constraints around it. but it is not going to stop, the criticism s david. >> right. and what you are going to hear, using taxpayer money, and they haven't.
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and hearing from the critics, that you should not use money for ransoms whether it is democrats or republicans, we have ended up having to strike a deal, and sometimes it is prisoners for prisoners, and sometimes it is prisoners for releasing money, and the nature of the iranian case is a little bit unusual because after the iranian revolution happened, the iranian government had paid for all kinds of things that had not been delivered including arms from the united states. that is part of how the iran deal came together in 2015 that did until president trump pulled out of it at least freeze the program in place. so everyone has to make these deals, and it is a point that christiane has made. democrats and republicans have made them. >> i am fascinated by the facetiming that the iranians allowed, and i am fascinated how they have played this. do you any explanation for why? >> well, there is not a
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unitaru iranian state. why they picked this moment, and using it to sort of push forward in a broader deal with the united states or the west, and maybe that moment will come. but i guess having released them from the prison, they then had to show the united states. that they were planning to follow through, and the most important thing for them in the last three or four weeks is to get that money transferred and my guess is, and purely a guess is that it is part of the making sure that anthony blinken, the secretary of state signed off on the release of the many knee. >> -- release of the money. >> and also, from the iranian
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hotel, we heard from the americans that they would not be physically released until now, and four to six weeks, and the ts were crossed on the is were dotted. >> and natasha brought up secretary blinken, and we will go natasha bertrand for that. >> that is right, john. we got a statement from blinken where he thanked all of the of course american counterparts in qatar, oman, switzerland helping to make this prisoner swap and deal become a reality. he reiterated that the president and i have no higher priority than the safety and security of american citizens at home and abroad, and he said under biden's leadership, we have secured the freedom of 30 americans around the world. he also expresses satisfaction and gratefulness of the efforts
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by the qataris who played a key role in this as intermediaries because the u.s. and the iranian delegations as they were negotiating, they never spoke face-to-face, and then two years and seven months as this deal crystallized the qataris were really a key part of making this happen. he reiterated as president biden did in his statement that americans should not go to iran. because there is such a risk of american ps bes being kidnapped wrongfully detained, they should heed the advice and stay away, because as john kirby, the national spokesperson says, the iranian regime does not distinguish between iranian americans and americanss
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citizens. he said this is a solemn day, and while they celebrate the release of these five citizens, one american citizen is still unaccounted for, and that is bob levinson, and this is something that the administration has tried to keep a spotlight on through all of this, and not all americans have been freed there. so it is really kind of em fa si -- emphasizing that it is a key success, but they will continue to try to bring back all americans. >> i am curious, because you bring up bob levinson, and they have mentioned the levinson family, and they deserve answers, and they said that we will sanction former president mahmou d aw adenajad was gone, n
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other leader has come clean with what has happened. >> and now to hear more about the sanctions. >> yes, the president has talked about how they were issuing the new sanctions in iran to hold iran accountable for bob
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levinson the american detained for more than a decade and believed to have died in iran. and the sanctions that the americans previewed is going to target two entities, the iran's ministry of intelligence and the officials have argued they have detained and interrogated detainees at the prison which is historical human rights abuses, and then also another set of issues against mahmoud adenajad. and also in the statements in celebrating americans, the five americans will now be returning back to the u.s., and back to their families, the president noted that there are still many
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more detainees that they are working around the world to release. think of eva n gerskovesch. >> and also, what we wanted to know what this means for the americans in iran, and this is not going to change anything in their view. >> yes, and think about this, the president of the united states is in new york, and the president of iran is in new york, president raisi, and they are no more than 10, 12 blocks
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apart, and it would not be hard to seize on this moment, and have a perfunctory moment to take it forward, but politically neither believes this could be allowed to happen. >> look, you are absolutely right, and particular ly raiss hardliner, and rouhani is not so much. and that is how they made the nuclear deal, but they are unable with someone like raisi, and hard to make deals with the u.s., and that the next u.s. administration would not pull out like trump did. so there is a former american iranian who worked in the state department on these issues and trying to figure out a way forward and they say that since 1979, 43 years since the islamic revolution, the republicans have
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been, and their word, virtue signalling to sound tough on iran, and the democrats have been trying to negotiate at all costs they say, and so no joined up, grown-up policy on an important relationship. it does not have to be an ally, because it is not, but it is an important relationship, and just like this. >> it is also the cruel reality of sanctions which is once you put the sanctions on, whether it is russian, north korea or iran, taking them off is really hard, because you are looking weak even if the reason is good. >> what leverage does the united states have, if any? >> well, the sanctions, and even under, and this is something that not many people talked about the context. even under the iran nuclear deal and certain sanctions were meant to be lifted in return for the halting of the deal, et cetera, it was impossible to get those sanctions properly lifted. many in the international community who were dealing with
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the financial services and the financial instruments were too af af afraid, they did not want to come up against the american sanctions again. and so it is complicated and no real effort to have a proper geopolitical foreign policy with iran. >> forgive me for interrupting, and give us a sense of the power of the sanctions, because new ones put in place, with iran, because the negotiation is not happening. >> david, you know it better than me, but it is cat and mouse, and sanctions from one side of the world, and iran goes around to the other side of the world, china, russia, and the other people of the world that sell a lot of oil to china, and they have a lot of dealings with those countries who are not on the western side of these sage shuns. >> and we have one set of sanctions that are coming off next month automatically, and it is a u.n. sanction on the sale of missiles and missile
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technology, and the problem with that is that it is an opening to the russians to begin to do more deals with the iranians, and the u.s., and the europeans have said they will keep their sanctions on, but the fact of the matter is that the u.n. ban is going to lift, and when that moment comes, i am afraid we could be headed into a tougher moment in the russian/iran negotiations. >> and not the lose this moment -- >> which is a great moment. >> and not the detract, but i am caught by this image here on the wall that we can show of these three of the five americans finally home. >> and the smile. the great smile. >> and it caught my eye to note that. >> and yes. >> and to raise it earlier, because i asked john kirby, and he said there is no calendar event that sparked this happening today.
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>> and there could have been some snaggle events as late as this morning. >> and what are you learning right now? >> we are told when they are on the tarmac there in doha, they are going to be given phones that they can skype their phone and let their families know they are on the way home, and this is a huge, huge moment. we saw the imagery of them greeting ibrahim pele who is from the state department, and also, the kconvoy for hostage affairs who have been huge in the process, so from here, once they take off from doha and we are told that they won't take off from doha until they have
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been checked out from medical personnel to make sure they are fit to fly. once they do take off, they will be given the post detained persons to be acclimated after they have been in prison, to get a hold of the narrative of the what happened and start to come to grips with how they can come ba to nar mall life, and after having such a traumatic time behind bars, and we have seen brittney griner take a part of the program, and the infamous six take part, and they are not expected to do that tonight, because they are to be in washington late, and they will see their families for first time in years and years. >> i cannot imagine what that is like after all they have been
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through. >> thank you, jennifer. we are waiting to hear from the secretary of state antony blinken. and just ahead, breaking news, five americans after years in custody, wrongfully detained in iran, and they are now free. stay with us. >> tech: cracked windshield on your new car? you don't have to take it to the dealer. bring it to safelite. we do more replacements and recalibrations than anyone else. >> customer: thank you so much. >> tech vo: schedule now. >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace ♪ every day, more dog people are deciding
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they are now free on qatari soil meeting with first the team of americans and government officials first greeted by the u.s. ambassador the qatar as they were walking first and finally down the steps to freedom. as we saw siamak namazi, emad sharghi, morad tahbaz walking down the steps with two more unidentified americans. they will fly from doha to washington, d.c., to be reunited with the families. we have a team of reporters standing by. becky anderson was on the ground in doha as the plane was pulling up. and we have christiane amanpour here and the long road here, and david as well. >> and to me, many march a couple of months ago to rattle
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the cages if you like, to say, i am here, and the spotlight needs to stay on, and please, president biden, re-up the negotiations and get us out. it is important, and people don't do things, unless they are put in the spotlight, and it is not easy for the government to do deal with iran. it is not easy. you can see what is happening now. they are getting the backlash, but it needs to be understood they are human beings. >> and hold on, because tony blinken is coming on. >> maybe he will say more about it. >> maybe he will. >> and now, the prisoners are out of detention and now en route to doha to the united to be reunited with the families in the united states. five of the seven had been unjustly detained and two others prevented from leaving iran. i spoke to them after they
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landed in doha. i can tell you that it was for them, for me an emotional conversation. it is easy in the work that we do everyday sometimes to get lost in the abstractions of foreign policy and relations with other countries and forgetting the human element that is at the heart of everything that we do, but today, their freedom, freedom of these americans for so long unjustly imprisoned and detained in iran means some pretty basic things. it means that husbands and wives, fathers and children, grandparents can hug each other again, can see each other again, can be with each other again. so it is a day that i am
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grateful for. i want to thank a number of partners who have been so vital to helping us to reach this day, and particularly the partner in iran, qatar, and switzerland who has played an essential role to free our fellow citizens. i want to thank the team in the state department and throughout the united states government who has been working to achieve this result for years now. as happy as we are at the freedom of our fellow citizens, we are also thinking of bob levinson who is not among them and is presumed to be deceased. bob's legacy lives on powerfully in the levinson act which is giving us new and powerful tools
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to crackdown and deter the practice of taking americans unlawfully to try to turn them into political pawns, and to abuse the international system in that way. one of the things that i heard in my conversation with our fellow citizens who are now free is their own determination, their own commitment, and their own conviction to continuing this work to help any americans unjustly detained to come home. to date in this administration, we have brought 30 americans home from places around the world where they were unjustly detained. that work will continue. at the same time, we will be working every single day to take steps to make this practice more and more difficult and more and more of a burden on those countries that ten engage in it
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you will see in the days ahead in the organizations who work with other countries who do just that. but for today, for this moment, it is very good to be able to say that our fellow citizens are free after enduring something that it would be difficult for any of us to imagine, and that their families have them back soon among them, and that in this moment at least, i have something very joyful to report. finally, let me say that throughout this effort, throughout the work that we have done to bring so many other americans home, president biden has demonstrated that he is prepared to make tough and difficult decision. i have no higher priority, the president has no higher priority than to make sure that americans who are unjustly detained elsewhere can come home and we will continue that work in the
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days ahead. >> mr. secretary, based on the talks this week, are you expecting talks not direct but through intermediaries more talkses? >> let me say that the engagements to bring home these unjustly detained americans has been a work of the engagement or our lack of engagement with iran, and for what was happening or not happening with respect to the nuclear agreement, we are focused on working on bringing these americans home. so it does not speak to anything else in the relationship. we continue to be determined to
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take whatever step is necessary to deal with actions by iran in a whole host of areas that are profoundly objectionable, and many countries find objectionable. at the same time, when it comes to perhaps the number one issue of concern which is iran's nuclear program, we believe that diplomacy is the best way to get a sustainable effective result, and one that we had previously with the iran nuclear agreement, and we'll continue to see if there are opportunity for that, and in this moment, we will see if there is engagement for those opportunities, but president biden is clear that he is committed to make sure that iran never acquires a nuclear weapon. >> will there be anything this week -- >> i would not anticipate anything this week, because these americans have endured
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things that many of us cannot imagine enduring, and in one case eight years, and they are now free. >> after the announcement, can you tell us that the aid released that had been frozen to support the iranian and the possibility of using these funds, and terrorist networks, and can you speak to how you would supervise and monitor the use of these funds for humanitarian purposes? >> thank you. in fact, when we met with the d.c. colleagues, our fellow americans had not yet arrived in doha and so we did not want to get ahead of the process, and having said that, as i mentioned, two countries in
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particular played an absolutely vital role in helping to get us to this day, and that is imam and qatar, and i have had many occasions to speak to them about the relationship with iran which is a challenge for each and every one of them, and including for us, and to discuss in that context some of the efforts that we were making to bring home our wrongfully detained americans. again, i don't want to speak for them, but everyone is supportive of that. in regard to the resource, it is very important to be very clear about what exactly this involved. as you know, this involved the access by iran to its own money. money that had accumulated in a korean bank because of oil sales that were made lawful at the time that the sales were made.
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from day one, our sanctions have clearly and indeed always exempt the use of resource for humanitarian purposes, because our aim is not to harm the iranian people, and our problem is with the iranian regime, and so from day one, the iranian monies that were in a korean bank have always been available to iran to use for humanitarian purposes. but for a lot of the technical reasons, they weren't able to access those funds where they were. so, the funds were moved to another bank where we have absolute oversight of how they are used, and they can only be used for humanitarian purposes. we have absolute confidence in the process of the system that is set up. by the way, the previous administration, the administration prior to ours had
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set up a similar mechanism that was never used but exactly for these kinds of purposes. so we are very confident that the iranian funds that had been made more easily available to iran as a result of the actions that we have taken will be used exclusively for humanitarian purposes, and we have the means and mechanisms to make sure that it happens. thank you very much. >> one last question. we have been listening to the u.s. secretary of state antony blinken and an emotional antony blinken talking about the freeing of five americans who have been wrongfully detained in iran, and in the case of one for eight year, and he talked about the immense amount of work that wept into the release. >> getting your thoughts on what we heard from the secretary of state, christiane? >> it is a human story, first and foremost. i have heard that he carried the name of the wrongfully detained in his breast pocket for a long
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time the concentrate his mind and the human cost for a long time, for him, it is a big moment, i am sure, and then he is going into the policy-speak, because the question is what do you next? what happen next? and so as siamak said over the past 44 years, the iranian regime has mastered the nasty game of caging americans and other foreign nationals and commercializing their freedom and calls the dystopian state of international hostages. so this is part of the plea that the governments of the world ban together to make this commercialization of the human lives like that null and void. that the costs outweigh the benefits, and that the challenge. >> there is the video we have been showing you all morning and re-up that and look at it. so as the people are coming down, it is five people who have been detained and they are deeply, deeply thankful, and they have said it over and over again, but they are relieved that they are now on their way
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to home, but they are free for the first time for one, 7 1/2 years, and for one, 5-plus years, and for them, it is a real moment for them and the country and the frankly. i don't't know, david, if we ha ever seen antony blinken this emotional. and he said that the moneys are available for iran to be used for humanitarian purposes, but for some reason they could not access them where they were, and all of that had to be worked out before any of this could happen. >> on the first point, i thought that the emotion that he showed is remarkable. i have known secretary blinken for decades and in public, i have never seen him quite like that. it tells you that they are reminding themselves that all of the diplomacy is not about
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moving the chess pieces, but it is about people, and it is a thing to remember today. the money was in south korea. so, because of the sanctions, you could not release it out. so they wanted access. i think thated the administrat wanted to make sure that it would be used for humanitarian purposes and it would blunt the political bludgeon for it. but what really struck me for this is the desire to have some kind of global arrangement to make this kind of hostage taking prohibited or at least so costly that the countries wouldn't do it.
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we don't have the structure internationally right now to do that. china and russia are two of the largest violators of this, and they are both on the security council, and permanent members with veto power. they would charge that we have taken political hostages, and so defining what is a political hostage is not an easy thing. >> we did hear as you spoke to jared genser, the attorney, who has been dealing for 7 1/2 years for trying to get one of the family member ps out, he said that something has to give. so both you, him, and every single person is saying that it has to be solved, but not at that point. >> not even close. >> conversation for the future. >> and christiane amanpour, we know that you to run and do a lot more reporting, and you are reporting crucial in what we saw happen, with your interview with siamak brought it forward to the
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world, and we will allow you the continue reporting, and david sanger, thank you as well. five americans now free. our special coverage continues after this. subway's now slicing their deli meats fresh. that's why they're proferred ,by this pro who won the superbowl twice. and this pro with the perfect slice. and if we profer it, we know america will toooo. what about spaniards? and i guess spain. hi, we've both got a big birthday coming up.. so we have a lot of questions about medicare plans. we've got a lot of answers! how can i help? well for starters, do you includeearing benefits? how about a plan wh dental, vision and hearing benefits? i sure like the sound of tha then how does a zero dollar monthly plan preum sound? ooooooooh! if you're new to medicare, call 1-888-65-aetna. we'll walk you through all your coverage and benefit options to help find the right plan for you.
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another major story that we are tracking this hour is the historic auw strike against the big three automakers and a strike against all three for the first time. the uaw is expected to meet with stellantis who owns jeep, dodge and ram in hopes of ending the four-day long strike, but there is another wrinkle here. it may not be just u.s. auto workers taking the action. everyone is keeping a close eye on canada today and tonight. vanessa yurkevich is outside of the plant in fort wayne, michigan, and what are you hearing from those on the picket line, and what are the people looking at when it is coming to canada? >> yeah. >> reporter: yeah, people are encouraged that the negotiations are ongoing and ford and gm met with the organization over the weekend, and stellantis today,
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but the uaw president shawn fain says that the progress is low. i want to bring in darlene heffley and ask her, the negotiations are slow, but moving, and what do you think about that? >> well, it is a good effect that it is having on everyone, and everyone has a good spirit, and we are hopeful that things are going to come out good for both sides. ua with, and ford have had good relationships in the past, but there are some things that need to be caught up on, and one of those things is the tiers. we need to abolish the tiers and employees need to be making same rate and accelerate to the same rate and that is a hope for the future, and ale loing in with that would be pensions. they need to have a pension. that is something that -- their future. without a pension, they can work anywhere. >> reporter: how much are the people coming in now? what is the starting wage here? >> it is around $16.75 an hour
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is what i understand. but the promises that they can build up to a certain rate, but uaw is holding out for more, because they deserve more. these people work their bodies they're just -- >> it's a lot of work to be there. thank you. >> thank you so much. >> thank you. i just want to address the question about canada and what's going on there. there's a union that represents over 5,000 ford workers at three plants. they have a strike deadline tonight. 11:59 p.m. if they do not come up with a deal, that union, with ford, even have a lot more people on strike atford, kate. >> the talks continue. there's one thing we do know at the very least. vanessa, thank you. this week, we're rinbringin you the series champions for
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changes. for me, it's someone i recently met when i moved to new york city. sophia chang is a fierce music executive and mentor, the passion for women of color is inspiring a movement. it's not just for young women. but women of any age. here's how she's empowering them to unlock their potential. ♪ this is my 27th year in television news. i have reported from -- at least 15 countries. i moved to new york in march of 2022. after 14 1/2 years in the field, the pivot from the field to the anchor chair was uncomfortable. people think that i'm fearless because i go into war zones. or because i go into conflict. it is an important day,s specially for the rebels. but i am afraid of failure
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because i grew up with very little. that battle to survive taught me to work really hard. ♪ what sophia does is she teaches you to break through that fear, to get to where you need to be. >> people always say, how do i start? i knew the second i met you, i invited you to one of my -- i know you for five seconds. i'm going to show you my new york. you're going to come over to myself how much. hey. gather humans like flowers. why do you do that? >> i'm a major and a play to study, the most famous line means one must cultivate one's garden. >> i love pulling people together. >> there are leaders, there are actors, there are professors. >> cheers everybody.
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>> you're there as a vessel to learn and to give back. so it's a beautiful quilt of human beings. sophia stitched a storied career, most famously managing an a-list of hip-hop royalty. >> i will never stop saying my by wu-tang. and i met wu-tang, and they're so reverent of asian culture. they brought me around to a love of my culture and self-love. >> a self-love that motivated s sophia exclusively for women of color. she calls it unlock her potential. it doesn't promise outcomes but it did promise capabilities. >> i wanted to be very specific about this.
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it's also for 18 and older. why? if you google mentorship programs, the vast majority are for mung people. those folks need membership, but so do we. and as we get older, as women of color, we are embembraced. so i'm really fighting it for all of the other women of color out there. >> i'm so thankful to sophia. >> how old were you when you decided i want to be a stand-up comedic? >> 48. ten years ago, i had a mid-life crisis. and then i saw the ads for unlock your potential. russell peters is the mentor i chose and also she picked me. >> my husband says he was go to be here, but he's not here.
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that's great news for me. i want to keep my job as a housewife. >> i have a big fall, i'm coming to madison square garden. >> sophia is a champion. she's going to make sure that you feel proud of what it is you accomplish. >> and it was incredible spending time with time with her. she is no joke. like you can't come out here sideways because you're always worried she might give you a kick. which i'm sure anyone would try to -- she seems remarkable. >> she's remarkable. >> you don't do anything sideways either. i love it, you two admit when you first met, literally five seconds. >> five seconds. what i think is the most beautiful thing, so often we hear about young people being mentored coming out of high school, college. you can be 80 years old. this woman we talked to, michelle, was 48 when she wanted
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to be a stand-up comedian. i'm terrified of standing up and telling a joke because i can't remember the punch line like a lot of us, john, you're so good at it. >> to make people laugh. >> so true. >> but also beautiful, it's hard for anyone out there that you even think that you would ever fail. >> oh, yeah, all the time. >> it's just -- >> you know, it's a thing, we're just used to grinding. and she teaches you to grind with joy, that's what i love about her. >> grind with joy, that's a new mantra of "cnn newsroom." be sure to tune in champion for change. it's a one-hour special. john, get us out of here. >> "inside politics" with splr special guests up next.
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♪ old school wisdom, with a passion for what's possible.
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- [narrator] every day, our lives are filled with choices, both simple and life-changing. what's not a choice? addiction to opioids like fentanyl. but even with opioid use disorder, you still have a choice. by choosing treatment, you choose family, your career and your life on your terms. choose change, california, and find medically proven treatment options at choosechangeca.org.

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