Global News Podcast - Donald Trump says he'll hold another election rally at the site of assassination attempt

Episode Date: August 13, 2024

Donald Trump says he'll hold another election rally at the site of the assassination attempt against him during a conversation with Elon Musk, which was livestreamed on X to an audience of several million people. Also, Indian doctors go on strike over the rape and murder of one of their colleagues, and how the authorities at South Korean airports try to avoid unwelcome insects creeping into the country.

Hello, this is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service, with reports and analysis from across the world. The latest news seven days a week. BBC World Service podcasts are supported by advertising. If you're hearing this, you're probably already listening to BBC's award-winning news podcasts. But did you know that you can listen to them without ads? Get current affairs podcasts like Thank you. Amazon Music with a Prime membership. Spend less time on ads and more time with BBC Podcasts. This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Nick Miles and at 13 Hours GMT on Tuesday, the 13th of August, these are our main stories.

Donald Trump has had a two-hour-long chat with Elon Musk about the economy, society and the election on the social media platform X. Indian hospitals are hit by a massive strike after the rape and murder of a doctor. And danger averted, a huge wildfire threatening the Greek capital Athens has been reduced to scattered hotspots. Also in this podcast, why European airlines are dropping flight routes to the Far East. The anointing of Kamala Harris as the Democrats presidential candidate has sucked the oxygen of publicity from Donald Trump. Not being the centre of mainstream media attention is a predicament the former president finds very uncomfortable,

so late on Monday he took to social media instead. He sat down for a live chat with Elon Musk on his platform X. It was a wide-ranging discussion, from the upcoming election to the US economy, the recent assassination attempt on Mr Trump, to crime in general. Donald Trump made a series of unsubstantiated claims that went unchallenged.

Crime all over the world is down. And wait till you see the numbers that we have. You know, this is migrant crime. These are rough people. These are people that are in jail for murder and all sorts of things. And they're releasing them into our country. And they're telling them, if you come back, we're going to kill you.

We're going to give you the death penalty or kill you. So they don't want to come back. But these are rough people. These are criminals that make our criminals look like nice people. And it's horrible what they're doing. Mr Trump also described the Democrat rival, Kamala Harris, as a radical left lunatic and said that anyone who votes for her needs their head examined. Well, in a statement after the event, the Harris campaign described Mr. Musk

and Mr. Trump as two self-obsessed rich guys who will sell out the middle class and who cannot run a live stream in the year 2024. For his part, Mr. Musk wrote on social media, happy to host Kamala on X Spaces 2. So what was behind the chat? Scott Jennings, a political strategist who was part of George W. Bush's successful re-election campaign in 2004, told the BBC the ex-president is looking to freshen up his campaign. A lot of his Republican supporters were very happy with the way he was prosecuting the campaign against Biden because he had settled on a very tight and easy to understand and user-friendly framework. It was strength versus weakness. They ruthlessly prosecuted that case, and it was frankly pretty easy to do. Now they're in a different race against a different person, and he's not apparently

personally settled on a framework within to prosecute the case against Kamala Harris. A lot of Republicans wanted to be sort of radical liberal versus, you know, common sense conservative, but he hasn't quite gotten there. He's not been able to beat that into the sort of tight box that you could use to deliver again and again. And honestly, it's concerning to a lot of his supporters because as she's had her surge in the polls and she's had her consolidation of her Democratic base, you know, they're sort of waiting for Donald Trump to come up with the next trick up his sleeve to sort of reel it in. Can Elon Musk make a difference? Well, of course. I think it was smart for him to continue to cultivate this relationship. He's very influential. He's very wealthy. Musk, I think, has been donating some money to the overall Trump effort. He could obviously do a lot more. think, has been donating some money to the overall Trump

effort. He could obviously do a lot more. But there are a lot of people on the X platform who simply don't get any of their information from the mainstream media. So they depend on the X platform for their interaction with politics. And so, yeah, I think if he continues to cultivate Musk and the people who follow him, it could be a good thing because some of those people are definitely going to be more inclined to be a Trump supporter than a Harris supporter. But you're not going to reach him by, you know, CNN every night, but you might reach him on these non-traditional platforms. So Trump was smart to do it. I expect Harris to do the same thing. They're going to both be scraping and clawing to talk to every single person they can. And in our world, people are increasingly getting information from places that aren't the mainstream news outlets. The issue, though, I suppose, is

those few electors who might still be undecided and the battle for them and whether that battle does take place online or actually in the more traditional places. Yeah, I think there's two groups of people. There's the few persuadables, you know, the folks who are genuinely torn about who to vote for. But more than that for Trump, I think there's a whole group of low propensity voters or even no propensity voters, people who don't often participate in U.S. elections. If you look at the polling, Trump is quite popular among those very politically disengaged Americans. And so if he can reach any of those on X or on any other non-traditional platform, what he has the possibility of doing is changing the composition of the electorate. So to me, it's maybe even less about persuasion of undecided and more about convincing people who rarely vote to get in the game at all. The political strategist Scott Jennings

talking to Justin Webb. Well, Donald Trump has already hit out at Kamala Harris over abortion, gun control and the future of public education. And the battle over the nation's schools is a particularly contentious issue in Arizona at the moment. Two years ago, the state introduced publicly funded universal school vouchers, which parents can use to opt out of public schools and pay for private education instead. Supporters, who include Donald Trump, say it's all about school choice. Opponents say it's designed to undermine America's secular public education system. From Phoenix, Alex Last reports. It's early morning at Phoenix Christian Preparatory School, and on the sports field, kids are running drills before the desert heat makes it unbearable to train outdoors.

Oh, Landon, you cheated! When I first began, we were all Caucasian, white, generally middle to upper class, and now we're a school of no majority. Jeff Blake is the school superintendent. His private school is seen as a model by school choice advocates. Most of the kids here use state-funded programs to help pay the fees. And so we're about a third African-American, a third Caucasian, a third Latino.

They're coming on city buses and they're coming in in fancy automobiles. The diversification could not have happened without school choice legislation. In 2022, Arizona introduced a controversial policy, universal school vouchers, which parents can use to pay for their child to go to private school or to cover homeschooling expenses. On average, a voucher is worth around $7,000 to $8,000 a year, roughly equivalent to the amount the state might spend on educating a child in public school. Essentially, the state is now subsidizing private education. And religion, says Jeff, is one reason people want to go private. Public schools are becoming increasingly secularized.

In many parents' point of view, it's becoming opposed to their faith tradition. And a school like Phoenix Christian provides a Christian worldview to look at the world through the eyes of the scriptures, through the Bible. State schools in Arizona are secular, regulated, there are standardized tests, teachers have to be qualified. No such rules apply to the private sector. They can pretty much teach what they want, how they want. For some parents, that's the attraction of private education. You know, I get a lot of weird looks because I say it's a parent's job to indoctrinate their children into their belief system. Misha is a mum of five and is one of a growing number who've opted to homeschool their kids,

using vouchers to buy books and pay for extracurricular activities. She feels the public school curriculum goes against her beliefs. For us, we're pretty traditional Christian. You know, we believe in creation, but they treat evolution as though it's fact, even though it's called the evolutionary theory. Misha says she's worried too about how schools discuss racism in America and in particular the age at which gender and sexuality are talked about in school. People have a right to live their life the way they want it.

That's absolutely OK. But I don't like that being brought into my kids so young. There is, though, opposition to vouchers. One of the big issues is the cost. A report by the non-partisan think tank the Grand Canyon Institute estimates the net cost of universal vouchers is $320 million this year and it's projected to rise even further. That, they say, puts a big hole in the state finances. Our schools are facing dire budget cuts in light of this voucher system.

Beth Lewis is executive director of Save Our Schools Arizona, a campaign group led by parents and teachers. We also are very concerned to see the types of schools that are popping up in Arizona in response to this voucher program. You know, a lot of extremist indoctrination academies opening up. There is a lot of curriculum that is very anti-LGBTQ. It's not rooted in real history or real science. What's wrong with a parent deciding to send their kid to such a place if that's what they want? I don't have any problem with a parent making

that choice, but I think that our taxpayer dollars shouldn't go to fund that choice. Republicans have cited Arizona's universal voucher program as a model for others to follow. And Donald Trump is a big supporter of school choice. But for Beth Lewis, vouchers could threaten the very existence of public education in America. The end goal is to privatize our public school system and I do fear that that is a very wrong turn for America. That report was by Alex Last. There's growing shock and anger across India at the murder of a trainee doctor inside a state-run hospital in Kolkata. The woman's body was found with multiple injuries last Friday. Doctors across the country are now on strike,

calling for justice and better workplace security. One protester outside a hospital in Kolkata said there should be no further delay in the investigation. We demand that they complete their investigation and arrest the culprits immediately. It's been 48 hours since the incident occurred and we're not interested in paying any attention to baseless rumours around the case. Our correspondent in Delhi, Umang Poddar, told me more.

The protests have been happening across multiple cities. In the capital Delhi also, 10 big government hospitals have suspended some of their services, although emergency services are still going on. But despite that, yesterday also I visited some hospitals to just see what's happening in that. And the doctors were saying that the number of patients right now, which you're seeing, is lesser because of the strike. And there have been concerns raised by patients also that they are having trouble getting adequate health care. So the protests are widespread and it's impacted the patients also, as well as the doctors. So the doctors are on strike. One imagines that they don't want patients to suffer. What are they asking for? Is this an

indefinite strike? Right, so they haven't told a date when they'll call off the strike, although multiple people today, even the court here in the matter, requested them to join their services back. One thing which they're doing is they are saying that we are not stopping the emergency health care services wherever the strikes are happening so that like people who need urgent care can get that apart from that thing the first thing is which they are asking for is a proper investigation in this matter and for arrests to be made quickly and the second thing they're asking for like better long-term solutions also for security of healthcare professionals. For example, like having a centralised law which can deal with these things,

having more preventive measures rather than measures which take place after incidents like these have happened. Indeed, and because this was the murder of a trainee doctor within a hospital, I mean, that will shock huge numbers of people because here is somebody who was there to make people healthy and actually was attacked in this brutal way. Right. And also a bunch of our colleagues also went to different hospitals in different states. And this was something which all doctors said that they have seen instances of violence in the past where patients or their family members have come and threatened doctors if they have not been happy with the services. So violence against healthcare professionals is something which people have seen in the past, but the gravity of this particular incident is something which has made this one that much more shocking.

Umang Poddar in Delhi. British Airways is cancelling its flights from London to Beijing and it's not the only airline that's pulled back from China. Since 2022, the ban on flying over Russian airspace has added hours to these routes, driving up the costs. Joanna Bailey is the editor of the aviation news website Simple Flying. She spoke to Leanne Byrne. The routes to Beijing, well particularly to anywhere in East Asia, are really important for airlines in terms of economic connectivity and their own profitability. But it's the overflight ban in Russia has really caused financial headaches. So, you know, they're having to go these very circuitous routes, which adds to their fuel costs,

it adds to their CO2. And they're also competing with airlines that don't have to face the same bans. So it's kind of an unlevel playing field. And I'm not at all surprised to see BA pull out. You know, we saw Virgin announcing that it was leaving Shanghai at the end of November. So I think we're going to be limited for connectivity from British airlines and from EU airlines going to the Far East. But all the Chinese carriers are capitalising very nicely on this. I'm sure they are, absolutely. I mean, do we know the cost implications of having to avoid Russian airspace? I mean, you mentioned fuel, I'm sure crew time as well.

Other operational costs are probably factored in. Yeah, I mean, I had a quick look at the Beijing route when BA announced this and they were flying on average an extra one and a half hours when they're going east and an extra two and a half hours when they're coming back from China. So you can imagine, I mean, it obviously depends which aircraft they're flying, but fuel costs for an hour on a plane a lot. I mean, we're talking in the tens of thousands of dollars. So just adding on another couple of hours makes a huge difference.

And as you mentioned, it's already a very long route, which means that crew accommodation needs to be higher than it would be on a short hill route because you've got to have people in rest periods and then, you know, people coming back to work the cabin. You actually need another whole set of flight attendants and an extra pilot to make these routes work. So it's not just the obvious costs like the fuel and the longer time. It's also these personnel costs, you know, and pilots don't come cheap. Virgin also pulled out. The US majors have found it very difficult to get back into China. I mean, they're nowhere near where they were, you know, back in 2019 before the pandemic. Everybody was still kind of in this

recovery period. And the Russian overflight ban has really kind of stunted any growth from our Western airlines going out there. However, the opposite is visible when we look at what's happening from China to the European cities and countries, because they're actually up 16% over 2019. So there's another 16% of flights since then. In comparison, UK and EU airlines are down 50%. That was Joanna Bailey of the aviation news website Simple Flying. In comparison, UK and EU airlines are down 50%. That was Joanna Bailey of the aviation news website Simple Flying. Still to come in this podcast. Our bedbug sniffing dog, Seko, can detect the pheromone scent specific to bedbugs with more than 95% accuracy.

How the authorities in South Korea are trying to avoid unwelcome insects creeping into the country. If you're hearing this, you're probably already listening to BBC's award-winning news podcasts. But did you know that you can listen to them without ads? Get current affairs podcasts like Global News, AmeriCast and The Global Story, plus other great BBC podcasts from history to comedy to true crime, all ad-free. Simply subscribe to BBC Podcasts Premium on Apple Podcasts

or listen to Amazon Music with a Prime membership. Spend less time on ads and more time with BBC Podcasts. The Israeli military is saying it's at peak alert for a potential attack by Iran. The government in Tehran has said it will take revenge for the killing of a Hamas commander on its territory earlier this month. It's a conflict that could spill over into Lebanon, where Iran backs the Hezbollah group. And if a war between Israel and Hezbollah goes ahead, Lebanon fears that a million people could become displaced in the country. The Lebanese minister in charge of coordinating an emergency plan is Nasser Yassin. Our correspondent Karim Torbi has been speaking to him and began by asking him if Lebanon was prepared for an all-out war.

We're doing our best to get our levels of preparedness for such an all-out war. But let's be honest and frank from the beginning. No country on earth, even those who are more developed, who have better stability and functioning systems, would stand with such a killing machine and genocidal machine that we're witnessing in Gaza. What's happening in Gaza and South Lebanon is an actual war, is an actual act of war that no country can stand. So we are conscious and aware of all the constraints and all the limitations and challenges,

but we're taking our responsibility as a functioning government to actually protect the people of Lebanon diplomatically on one track, but also in case there's an all-out attack and aggression on us, to be prepared to get the people into shelter, provide them the basic food, water and sanitation, medication, and so on. And what scenarios are you expecting in case of, you know, a very... We're working on different scenarios. The worst-case scenario is the scenario that we witnessed in July

2006 when the Israelis waged a war on Lebanon for 33 days. And that scenario resulted in more than one million Lebanese being displaced for around five weeks. So we're taking this as a benchmark, as a point where we're comparing with and assessing our level of preparedness and the needs we need to have in order to be prepared for such scenario. And does Lebanon have the means to deal with such challenges? Again, no country has such means. If you look at the current context of such a killing machine that we're seeing now in the region.

But we are putting aside some contingency funding given the level of finances and the challenges we have in the treasury in Lebanon, but we're putting aside some contingency financing for the basic things. Health, civil defense, including rubber removal and additional food and basic supplies for people if they get displaced or be forced to be displaced from their houses. That was the Lebanese minister, Nasser Yassin, speaking to Gareen Torby. Ukraine's military push into parts of western Russia was a move that few people anticipated. But now, eight days after it began,

thousands of Ukrainian troops are still operating in Russian territory. On Monday, President Putin accused Ukraine of committing crimes against the Russian people. He said Kyiv would receive a worthy response. And on Tuesday morning, Ukraine's air force said air raid sirens had been activated across the country following reports of Russian airstrikes. But how is Ukraine's incursion being viewed in Russia? Here's the view from the streets of Moscow. Honestly, I only follow the news when I'm listening to the radio in the car in the morning. I feel sorry for the people who have ended up in this situation. I would like this all to end. It wasn't a surprise. I think time will mend things.

Maybe it's the kind of reaction that was supposed to happen. And they probably should have been ready for anything. Well, I think it's a tragedy. I think that we should all, as Russian people, help our neighbours, people who live in this region. And how is this all being reported inside Russia? Our Russia editor Steve Rosenberg has been speaking to James Kopnell. What is happening in southern Russia is a huge deal because this is the first time in more than 80 years that foreign troops have crossed into Russia and are on Russian soil, fighting on Russian soil and seizing Russian territory.

And for a country which is constantly reminded here by those in power of the horrors of the Second World War, the horrors of invasion, World War II is really part of the psyche of this nation. You know, this is a huge deal. Is it the sort of huge deal that is likely to rally support behind the war effort, behind further conflict with Ukraine, or could it cause division, do you think? narrative that Russia is under threat, that Russia is a besieged fortress surrounded by enemies who are sort of plotting night and day to invade and destroy and divide Russia into small pieces. This is the kind of narrative you hear in the state media here from morning till night. However, on the streets of Moscow yesterday, we were chatting to people, and I got a sense of deep resignation from people.

People seem to be resigned to what is happening. I didn't get the feeling that people were about to rally around the flag and the president and the government and look for an escalation of this. People have seen so much happening over the last two and a half years, so many dramatic events, starting with, of course, the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, partial mobilization declared by the Kremlin last year, do you remember that, mutiny by Wagner mercenaries who marched on Moscow, so many dramatic events that now we have another dramatic event, Ukrainian soldiers

seizing villages in southern Russia. This has been such a roller coaster for people here that I think they're just resigned to what is happening and people do not feel they can influence the situation in any way and they're just waiting to see how things pan out. Steve Rosenberg. Now to Greece, where the wildfires that have been sweeping around the capital Athens have left scenes of utter devastation and forced many people to leave their homes. My house, it was utterly destroyed.

Even the walls fell down. There's nothing left. There's no morale, no courage. There's no money anymore. Everything was destroyed. The house, the only thing I cared about was saving my dogs. So I left everything behind. Money, belongings, everything. I first arrived early when the area was burning and they didn't let us approach,

so we didn't know what was happening with the house. We didn't know if we would find it again because we have pine trees in the yard. When we were able to pass at about 11pm and saw that the house was still standing, it was something else. But now there are positive signs that the fires are finally being brought under control. Officials say the walls of flame that leapt tens of metres into the air have now been reduced to a few scattered hotspots. Our correspondent Jessica Parker was at Neopanteli, northeast of the centre of Athens.

We headed to this suburb of northeast Athens, one of the areas that was hit by those wildfires. And it's quite interesting when you survey the damage, it's very patchy. So I'm looking right now at two completely burnt out vehicles, a van and a car. And then another patch of land can actually be relatively undamaged. And we've also seen places where there's a house that has been severely damaged, but then a property nearby is completely fine. So it has made its way, the wildfire, through this area, but in quite a kind of disparate way. What we're hearing from the fire service in terms of the bigger picture is that, as you were mentioning, no major active front anymore

they're dealing with scattered hot spots but it's still really hot the winds pick up a lot from time to time and i do keep seeing those canada water planes that dive in and get water and then drop it on areas that need to have that need to see water they keep flying over our heads so i think very much the authorities still keeping an eye on the area and trying to make sure those hotspots don't develop into something worse. So the conditions haven't improved. Is it sheer force of numbers of the firefighters that's done this? It's kind of difficult for sure to say exactly how they've managed to dampen this down.

Hundreds of firefighters have been out. Overnight, though, of course course they had to ground aircraft that were monitoring things in the sky but also helping tackle the fires because they do that after dark but from this morning it seemed like the situation was improved quite significantly and you could partly tell that because the sky over Athens was no longer this big kind of grey cloud as it had been yesterday. The sky is much clearer, although I have to say where I am and other places we've been, where there's a lot of burnt out pine trees and kind of burnt out ground, it's still, you can really smell the fire that was there not long ago. But look, I think

the authorities have been defending their response to this fire, saying they think they acted quickly and that is of course amid fresh criticism that this has happened again a wildfire has broken out again in the East Attica region and even reached into the suburbs of the capital city. Jessica Parker in Athens. Paris is still basking in the glow of the success of the Olympic Games but athletes returning to South Korea might spend a bit more time in arrivals than usual. A special team has been deployed at the Incheon International Airport in South Korea to make sure athletes don't have any creepy crawlies in their suitcases.

Wendy Urquhart reports. The bedbug crisis in Paris made headline news in October last year, and videos of them crawling on the Paris metro helped provoke a wave of insectophobia in the run-up to the Olympic Games. South Korea is also no stranger to bedbugs. An infestation in 2023 caused widespread alarm but was swiftly dealt with. Now the authorities are determined to prevent any possibility of bedbugs freeloading their way into the country inside the suitcases of its Olympic athletes. The star of the South Korean campaign is a two-year-old

beagle, which the team's researcher Kim Min-soo insists has a real knack for sniffing dog, Seko, can detect the pheromone scent specific to bed bugs with more than 95% accuracy. It can be sensitive for travellers to have someone open their suitcases, but Seko can detect bed bugs by sniffing the air inside a suitcase with only about a third of the zip open. Bed bugs hide in bed frames, mattress seams, cushions and even in the crevices of furniture. Then they feast on people's blood while they're sleeping. Although they don't spread disease, the itchy bites are guaranteed to send you up the wall. Experts say they've been making a comeback over the past two or three decades all over the world. Wendy Urquhart.

And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later on. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, you can send us an email. The address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at Global News Pod. This edition was mixed by sydney dundon and the producer was oliver burlough the editor is karen martin i'm nick miles and until next time goodbye if you're hearing this you're probably already listening already listening to BBC's award-winning news podcasts. But did you know that you can listen to them without ads?

Get current affairs podcasts like Global News, AmeriCast and The Global Story, plus other great BBC podcasts from history to comedy to true crime, all ad-free. Simply subscribe to BBC Podcast Premium on Apple Podcasts or listen to Amazon Music with a Prime membership. Spend less time on ads and more time with BBC Podcasts.