poppy is off this week. sara sidner is with us after a brief tour in florida to cover the hurricane yesterday. we are going to be covering that again today. neighborhoods have been changed forever by hurricane idalia. it is now a tropical storm off the carolina shores. but officials are already assessing the damage in florida and georgia. we will be talking with fema administrator about the latest on the ground in a moment. senate minority leader mitch mcconnell freezes up in front of reporters again. it is the second time in disturbing scene played out this summer. new reporting now about what mcconnell s been doing behind the scenes. and the department of health and human services is recommending that the d.e.a. significantly ease restrictions on marijuana. it is currently a schedule 1 drug the same as lsd and heroin. it wouldn t legalize marijuana federally, could it be a step in that direction? we will explore. this hour of cnn this morning starts right now. we ar
how that s not only culminated with the new tapes tonight. that s one of the special reports we work on around here. that s coming up if you want to stay with me. as for the top story tonight it is another win in accountability, a new defeat for one of donald trump s closest indicted aides. today a federal judge in washington ruling giuliani, trump lawyer giuliani defamed two georgia election workers with lies with legally false claims. that s a legal determination. he did that on his way to trying to get the election to be stolen. those workers, ruby freeman and her sure shane moss have come up before. if you follow this show or the jan 6th committee hearings you recognize the name. while different people in public life and most poll workers don t enter public life, have to deal with some public scrutiny, what they went through legally, i can tell you today, was way over the line. it was defamation, lies, threats and intimidation. i mentioned the hearings. they spoke memorab
this is what that actually looks like or looked like in keaton beach, florida. and gabe showed us the aftermath there. some boats are being sent in to check for survivors. the water thankfully seems to be receding here after all of the storm surge. but i just wanted to show you the national guard here. with response to your question where we could see the wind, we saw a lot of tree damage. a lot of tree damage. downed power lines. you can kind of tell where the worst of it was. as it blows through. and in some places it looks like a tornado came through. it is remarkable when you see the intensity of this storm. the power of a hurricane as it comes on shore. that is our colleague gabe gutierrez. he spent his morning in perry, florida, about a half an hour north. where roaring winds blow over this gas station awning before knocking out a billboard right where gabe was doing some of his reporting. a few minutes later, gusts nearly lifted him and his crew and their equipment
compensate the mother and daughter for their on going pain and distress. plus, we ll expose republican s new tactic of trying to upend democracy by targeting election officials and judges who pushed back against their false claims of widespread voter fraud. and in the wake of another campus shooting, unc student newspaper delivers a gut wrenching front page that revealed what it s really like to be a member of the run, hide, fight generation. that paper s editor in chief joins me later in the show. but we begin tonight with the architect of the plan to keep donald trump in power after he lost. john eastman, one of 19 co-defendants facing charges in the georgia criminal case. last week, eastman was booked into the fulton county jail, still pushing the big lie immediately after surrendering to authorities over efforts to overturn the georgia election. eastman is the author of the coup memo. advancing the theory that u.s. vice president has unilateral authority to reject c
overnight former president trump was indicted accused of trying to turn over the 2020 presidential elections. not only trump, but 18 others are indicted. each defendant is facing racketeering. in the indictment, he tried to convince one to change the election. former president trump calls is a witch hunt and trying to derail his campaign. trump facing a charges of 91 charges in georgia, florida, new york and washington d.c. we have a ton to get to. cnn this morning starts right now. if you re just waking up, this is significant. donald trump and 18 codefendants are facing a slew of charges. they include rico racketeering charges that were meant to take down mob basses bosses and gangs. they say that he created fake electors and ellie breeching voting systems to try and find evidence of voter fraud. we have team coverage all morning. we ll start live outside the fulton county courthouse. trump has been ordered to surrendered by next friday. reporter: fani willis gi