The Amanpour Hour Aired March 02, 2024 - 11:00 ET THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. [10:59:45] … CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello everyone, and welcome to THE AMANPOUR HOUR. Here's where we're headed this week. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: Shaken by the suffering top international aid leader Jan Egeland sees the situation in Gaza with his own eyes. JAN EGELAND, SECRETARY GENERAL, NORWEGIAN REFUGEE COUNCIL: You have to come to Gaza to understand the devastation, the destitution and the desperation of the people here. AMANPOUR: Also ahead, psychologist Mary Trump's analysis of her uncle's obsession with the strong man syndrome. MARY TRUMP, PSYCHOLOGIST: It is really no laughing matter when at that point the leader of the free world is being described as a prepubescent child. AMANPOUR: Then the horse race and an age-old dilemma. Why the obsession over Bidens age misses the point. MARGARET SULLIVAN, GUARDIAN U.S. COLUMNIST: I wonder whether people are as aware of Trump's authoritarian plans as they are of Biden's age. AMANPOUR: Also, this hour, troubled waters. The death of two Chinese fishermen spark confrontation off the coast of Taiwan. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If there is conflict, both sides would be devastated. AMANPOUR: And from my archive civilians under siege in Sarajevo dodging sniper fire to feed their families. A father holds a half rotten apple for thishe4 has risked his life. (END VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Christiane Amanpour in London. The impact of the war in Gaza is ratcheting up on Israel, on the United States and on the people of Gaza themselves. More than 30,000 are now dead, close to half of them children, the unthinkable toll of Israel's offensive there since the October 7 attack by Hamas. In an astonishing conversation this week, UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini told me the looming famine in Gaza is now so bad that some people have been eating animal feed to survive. And even that now is running out. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) PHILIPPE LAZZARINI, COMMISSIONER GENERAL, UNRWA: We see more and more situation where there is not even enough animal food for human consumption for the people there. AMANPOUR: Wait, wait, wait -- let me just stop you. What did you say? (CROSSTALKING) AMANPOUR: Animal foods good for human consumption? That's what they're relying on. Theres not even enough of that. LAZZARINI: There is not even enough of animal food, animal fodder for people to eat or to do bread with animal fodder. (END VIDEO CLIP) AMANPOUR: And at the end of the week this crisis was evident when more than 100 people were killed under Israeli fire and then trampled in the chaos after trying to reach food distribution trucks. That situation is just what the head of the Norwegian Refugee Council, Jan Egeland, had warned me about earlier this week. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: Jan Egeland, welcome to the program from Rafah. EGELAND: Thank you very much. AMANPOUR: What is it like to be there and see it for the first time? We've heard a lot, we've seen pictures, we hear reports from inside. What are you seeing with your own eyes? EGELAND: Well, Christiane, you have to come to Gaza to understand the devastation, the destitution, and the desperation of the people here. I have never, in my many, many years as an aid worker, seen a place that has been so bombarded for such a long time with such a trapped population without any escape. So people are traumatized beyond belief. They live under the most horrific conditions. I was in a school today with 50 people sleeping in a small classroom, you know -- 250, 200 people sharing one latrine. And no real water, food, too few mattresses even. We're trying to do all we can as the Norwegian Rescue Council, but we're really, really overstretched in this ocean of needs. [11:04:44] AMANPOUR: Jan Egeland, you know, finally the international community has started to airdrop some aid. But what we saw was that some of it dropped into the sea. And the pictures are really ones of, you know, I mean, total, just panicked. People are scavenging. People are fighting each other. People are trying to get the, you know, plastic -- I guess they're military rations. Can there be no better way of delivering aid even in the midst of a war? EGELAND: There can be a much better way, really. And it's up to Israel, with the United States and Egypt, to fix it. AMANPOUR: You know, as people who are saying, how can we send aid into the people who killed our women and children and kidnapped our people? So, the politics is even playing out and the trauma on the border there. But I want to ask you how you react to, let's just say, Palestinians who talked to "Reuters" said about the airdrops. "We came throwing ourselves toward death to get some flour. We can't find anything. Have mercy on us." Another said, "Our life has become hell." And we know, because a CNN investigation found that Israel actually fired on a U.N. convoy carrying food supplies earlier this month, February 5th. EGELAND: Yes, yes. And also say -- I mean, it's beyond belief that people who are mourning, of course, the worst massacre in the history of Israel on the 7th of October, would believe that taking away food from children and women, completely innocent, had nothing to do with the 7th of October, could can in any way help the poor hostages here. The Hamas militants have food and they are in tunnels. They have nothing to do with the people that we aid. The chaos, yes, around the aid line is becoming worse and worse because there's so little aid coming in. Today, I'm pretty shaken actually from what I saw. The minute we crossed the border from, you know, orderly and sparsely populated Sinai, you see the aid trucks going full speed down the road, being chased by gangs of youth who jumped the trucks and before our eyes, loot mattresses, blankets, food, et cetera, to the desperate people outside who want to get some aid. AMANPOUR: So Jan, let me ask you this. (CROSSTALK) EGELAND: Yes. AMANPOUR: Jan, is this anarchy? Is this stealing or is this an attempt to distribute this, you know, in as crazy a way as you describe, to distribute this aid? EGELAND: I think it is actually self-service by those strongest who have received no aid and who have grandmothers, children, nephews who are starving. It's -- people are not looting each other, they loot what they see as an international community coming with far too little to them, so then they take what they can get. We have a special way of going in with NRC. We have had none of our trucks looted yet and we do orderly distributions with local organizations who but I don't let have to use their open trucks in a situation of desperation. And by the way, the police, which was supposed to have some order in this, was bombed repeatedly by Israel, the blue uniform police. So, they are done now. They are in civilian clothing trying to shoot in the air. No, it's really also anarchy in some places. AMANPOUR: Let me ask you then, because you're in Rafah specifically, you've probably had some access towards Khan Younis. But what a lot of people are very concerned about right now, including the residents who we can manage to hear from, are in the north. There's a picture that we're going to play. It's a mother who says there's no more milk in the enclave or at least up there. So, she's wrapping a date in a gauze and letting her baby boy suck on it as if to suck all the juice out of this date. EGELAND: Yes. AMANPOUR: We have heard that there are stories of young children saying that they would rather die. We've heard adults say they are going to -- they're preparing to die. They think they will all die. [11:09:49] AMANPOUR: Can you get to the north, where we understand there is a famine rising there? What do you know about the north? Will you go to the north? EGELAND: I'm not able myself now to go to the north. NRC has eight aid workers in the north and they are themselves starving. We got a little bit of food to our aid workers the other day, but the convoys have really been thoroughly looted from the desperation and lawlessness in this bombarded north. So, there's very little aid. There is very little supplies there to start with. So, famine is breaking out there. There's no other way to describe it, which again shows that the Karni crossing, which is also from Israel, Israel could fix this. They are the occupying power. They have the overwhelming military superiority. They could have convoys going over Karni crossing, which is in the middle area from where you can easily reach the north. It's very hard from here south in Rafah and Kerem Shalom area. AMANPOUR: It's really such a disaster. Listening to you is very, very disconcerting. Jan Egeland, thank you very much indeed. EGELAND: Thank you. Thank you for having me. (END VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: And as this sheer basic desperation for food turns more deadly, later, I will show you how the people of Gaza besieged and under fire face the same humanitarian horrors that I witnessed covering the Bosnia war during the 1990s. The civilians under siege in Sarajevo, who risked death for food, even a piece of fresh fruit for their children. That's coming up later from my archive. But first, I ask psychologist Mary Trump about her uncle's strong man syndrome. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TRUMP: It is extremely important to him that he get the benefits of associating with strong men, like Orban and Putin. (END VIDEO CLIP) [11:11:56] (COMMERCIAL BREAK) AMANPOUR: Welcome back. Now, former president Trump reportedly has an old friend in town next week. He's Hungary's right-wing Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who has turned his country into the definition of an illiberal democracy. Orban is said to be on route for a private meeting at Trump's Florida club and they'll have plenty to agree on, like, their affinity for President Vladimir Putin of Russia, who Orban has quoted publicly and Trump has praised for his quote, strong control over Russia. How will authoritarianism and Trump's admiration for these so-called strong men play with voters in November? Let's bring in the former presidents niece, who also happens to be a clinical psychologist. Mary Trump, welcome back to the program. So let's start by asking you that question. Have you ever been surprised or is it you know, true to type that your uncle showed such an affinity for people like Orban or Xi or Putin or even, you know, Kim Jung-un of North Korea, who he went, you know, miles and miles over to Asia to actually meet a couple of times. TRUMP: No, actually one of the things that should worry everybody about Donald is that he has never evolved beyond the kind of person he was when he was very young. And it's not at all surprising because he grew up in an authoritarian household. And because of the way my grandfather, who was a white straight-up sociopath, was that Donald became the favorite son and he knew what he needed to do in order to stay on my grandfather's good side because he also understood what would happen to him if he didn't. So he is very comfortable in this milieu and it is extremely important to him that he get the benefits of associating with strong men like Orban and Putin. But also that he be on their good side. AMANPOUR: You know, that's really interesting the way you frame it. The good side, the fact that as a boy, he wanted to please his father. Let me play for you something that a contemporary of his, when he was in office, the Australian prime minister said recently about him and Putin. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MALCOLM TURNBULL, FORMER AUSTRALIAN PRIME MINISTER: I mean, I've been with Trump and Putin Trump is in awe of Putin. When you see Trump with Putin, as I have on a few occasions, he's like the 12-year-old boy that goes to high school and meets the captain of the football team. My hero. It is really creepy. (END VIDEO CLIP) VAUSE: So you know, that was done in that context. It was a lot of yuck, yuck, but I'm really stunned by how what you said and I didn't know what you're going to say about his childhood matched exactly what a former prime minister of Australia witnessed. TRUMP: Yes, and I think what's important to know that most people certainly wouldn't, and it is really no laughing matter when at that point the leader of the free world is being described as a pre- pubescent child with a crush on an older, more powerful person -- what the consequences are. [11:19:45] TRUMP: It's not simply that Donald knew that by fulfilling his father's demands to be the quote, unquote "killer", to be the successful one. It was understanding what would happen to him if he failed to do those things because he had an object lesson in my father, who was quite literally destroyed by his inability to fill the role my grandfather required of him. AMANPOUR: There's so many layers to this. So can I ask you then, again this leads from what you've just said. You know, he absolutely has an obsession with success. So what do you think it means to him? What keeps him up at night, for instance, about the latest -- one of the latest legal rulings which said that he had to pay something like half a billion dollars in this in this money business case in New York. TRUMP: Yes. Well, there are a few things. And first of all, I think it's really important to clarify. It's not that he'd be successful; it's that he be seen to be successful because deep down Donald knows that he is nothing of what he pretends to be. He's nothing like the portrait he shows to the world, at least to those people who were inclined to believe the myths he tells about himself, right. So I think what keeps him up at night, other than a lot of diet coke would be this concern. One, that he doesn't actually have the money, which is a distinct possibility. You know, we could say that this offer to come up with only $100 million was a ploy to buy more time or to see if it would work, but he may not indeed have that much cash, would reveal not just to the world, but to himself, that he is not as rich as he claims to be. He is not the savvy businessman who's been betrayed in New York tabloids since the 1980s. And that would be a crushing blow, not just to his image but to his sense of himself. AMANPOUR: Mary Trump, I want to ask you because you openly admit you haven't actually spoken to him for all these reasons because you disagree with him and this since 2017. Nut let's just go back to 2015 when he came down the escalator with Melania in that whole, you know, choreographed announcement of candidacy. When you see that, and those pictures and you fast forward to those now and him back on the campaign trail. Do you see anything's changed? Do you see anything different? TRUMP: Yes. Listen, I think for anybody in his position, it would be impossible not to be affected by the massive amounts of stress he is under. The conflicts, just the stress of running again, the stress of having lost, you know, it's going to take its toll. I see somebody who's quite desperate and who is terrified. I think deep down, Donald has always been a terrified little boy. But the truth is, he has much, much more to be terrified about now. His entire future hinges on his ability to get back into the White House. And despite the fact that there are plenty of people helping them out, including it would appear some members of the Supreme Court that is not something that he can totally count on. So he's going -- it's going to impact his ability to think straight, to express himself. Weve seen in the last decade or so, the difference in how he performs during depositions, for example, he appears to have much less impulse control and he appears to have a much lessen ability to be coherent for any length of time. So yes, I do see differences and I think we can put that down to the fact that his life is just a constant stress. AMANPOUR: Mary Trump, thank you very much indeed. And coming up on the show, media critic Margaret Sullivan says it's time to skip the clickbait coverage this election cycle and get back to reporting the real issues. But first, we show you the dangerous game of cat and mouse between China and Taiwan at sea. [11:23:59] (COMMERCIAL BREAK) AMANPOUR: Now concerns about the U.S. election are not restricted to the western world. Fear is rapidly growing in Taiwan that if the next president abandons Ukraine, he could similarly dump support for the island nation. And this couldn't be coming at a worse time as tensions bubble over in the strait which separates Taiwan from the Chinese mainland. Will Ripley is there with this report (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) WILL RIPLEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Just off the foggy coast, near Taiwan's frontline Kinmen Island, the Chinese coast guard intercepts a Taiwanese tourist boat. Taiwan's coast guard calls it an unprecedented forced inspection, triggering panic among passengers and the public. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was very scary. I was afraid that I might not be able to return to Taiwan. RIPLEY: These are the waters where that incident happened, where the Chinese coast guard boarded the Taiwanese tourist boat and checked everyone's ID spooking a lot of the people on board. You can see how close we are to the skyline of the Chinese city of Xiamen. There are Chinese constructing boats all throughout these waters. Pretty easy to mix up, which side the Chinese side or the Taiwanese side you're on when you're this close. [11:29:54] RIPLEY: Cross strait tensions rising here ever since the lunar new year holiday. A Chinese speedboat capsized in a chase with Taiwan's coast guard similar to this one several years ago. Chinese fishing boats accused by Taiwan of trespassing the islands territorial waters more than 1,000 times last year alone. MR. CHANG, TOUR BOAT OPERATOR IN KINMENT: As the speedboat was snaking, trying to evade inspection and even drifting, it capsized and four people fell into the sea. RIPLEY: Two Chinese fishermen drowned, two others survived, telling a conflicting story. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Even if we make quick turns, we won't capsize. It only capsize when it was rammed into. RIPLEY: An infuriated Beijing accuses Taipei of covering up the fishermen's deaths. Chinese officials blamed Taiwan's ruling party reiterating Beijing's sovereign claim over Taiwan, promising to step up patrols in the area. Taiwan is deploying its own coast guard in response. Analysts say the mainland may be testing how far it can push Taiwan trying to erode its ability to control waters long governed by Taipei. Weve been out on this vote for less than two hours. Weve already seen at least four Chinese coast guard boats including that one right over there, which just made a U-turn. Our captain says that means they're monitoring us just like we're watching them. Rattling the nerves of Taiwanese tour boat operators. Do you worry that this could be the place? Base where there could be the beginning of a bigger conflict between Taiwan and mainland China. CHEN CHIEN-WEN, DEPUTY CAPTAIN, KINMEN COAST GOARD: To be frank, I'm concerned, but this is not what all people want. If there is conflict, both sides will be devastated. RIPLEY: Both sides watching what happens next. Surging tensions on the Taiwan strait threatening to spill over. Will Ripley, CNN -- Kinmen, Taiwan. (END VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: Quite concerning. Still to come on the show, from my archive, echoes of Gaza today. Civilians under siege in Sarajevo dodging soldiers and sniper fire to feed their families. But first, is the tail really wagging the dog over Biden's age? (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SULLIVAN: And then, you know, there's all kinds of reports about well, the public is very concerned about this because he's dogged by these questions. Well I asked, who's doing the dogging. [11:32:23] (COMMERCIAL BREAK) AMANPOUR: Welcome back to the program. Fight fire with fire, they say. President Biden turned the hysteria about his age on its head this week by attacking the advancing years of his political adversary, Donald Trump, who's only four years his junior. That was on "The Late Night Show". And my next guest says, enough is enough with the media's hyperbolic herd mentality coverage of Biden's age and competency. Critic, columnist and academic Margaret Sullivan urges us to get real about the issues because this election is about much more than quote, "chasing clicks." (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: Margaret Sullivan, welcome back to our program. SULLIVAN: Thank you very much. AMANPOUR: So look, we wanted to talk to you because you wrote an article calling out, quote, "The media's circular logic and destructive obsession with Biden's age". So I wanted to really drill down to make sure I fully understand it. Is it a problem for the Biden campaign or is it a problem for the people at large to really understand and know what's going on. SULLIVAN: Well, I think it distorts reality. We know that Biden is old. He's 81. His likely opponent, Donald Trump, will be 78 very soon. And we're not telling the public, we're not really doing our job as members of the press when we fixate on something. And then, you know, there's all kinds of reports about well, the public is very concerned about this because he's dogged by these questions. Well, I ask, who's doing the dogging? AMANPOUR: The dogging you're saying is the press essentially. SULLIVAN: In -- at least in part. AMANPOUR: So, as you know, there's been quite a lot of exploration of this whole phenomenon. It's gone a bit viral. Democrats who are in a bit of a tizzy about a lot of the reporting on it. But do you believe, just to get it clear, that age is a media invention? SULLIVAN: No, absolutely not. I do not think that age is a media invention. It's a clear issue in the campaign. Biden's mental acuity and Trump's mental acuity certainly deserve to be taken seriously. I just think it's gone -- it's become the only topic at times. AMANPOUR: Margaret, I wonder whether you look back and worry about certain other issues that can be, certainly in retrospect very bothersome, and the media played a very negative role in terms of this herd mentality. Whether it's the Hillary Clinton emails which turned out to be nothing, or whether indeed was the rush to war in 2002 or 2003 to Iraq. Do you think that we should be worried? [11:39:50] SULLIVAN: Well, I do think that the press has a tendency to have a pack mentality or a herd mentality as you put it. And we saw that in all of those cases -- the Hillary Clinton emails and the run-up to the Iraq war and now this age issue. I don't think that they're equal. I mean, I don't think we're in a situation that equals the, you know, essential invention of weapons of mass destruction. But it speaks to the tendency of the press to sort of all get on the same page. And the difficulty and the rareness of journalists taking a different point of view or presenting things differently. We didn't see too much of that in any of those cases. AMANPOUR: Can I play for you something that president Biden just said on a very well-received late-night interview with Seth Meyers and he addressed head on the age issue, but he also put it in context of performance and you know, results. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Number one, you've got to take a look at the other guy. He's about as old as time, but he can't remember his wife's name. SETH MEYERS, LATE NIGHT HOST: Yes. BIDEN: Number one. Number two, it's about how old your ideas are. Look, I mean this is a guy who wants to take us back. He wants to take us back on Roe v Wade, he wants to take us back on a whole range of issues that are 50, 60 years. They've been solid American positions. (END VIDEO CLIP) AMANPOUR: So Margaret listening to that, its delivered incredibly, you know, sharply. Why is it then that the media tends not to focus on performance and results good or bad and rather this, whatever it is the horse race, the stuff around the edges that we're talking about right now. SULLIVAN: Well, I wish I knew the answer to that. I only know that it is a reality that the press, the political press, tends to focus on the horse race. They concentrate on polls, they concentrate on the gaffe of the day. And it's difficult to get the media to look at such things as what, you know, what have these candidates accomplished? What are they likely to do if elected or reelected? The substance is lacking. AMANPOUR: Now, you called out this circular and destructive media logic. What would you say? Because you were ombudsman, you had a very major position at major newspapers, including "The New York Times", what would you say to the leaders of our mainstream news organizations when they see these kinds of stories all over their platforms. I think that the leaders of major American news organizations should have front and center in their minds and be communicating to their staffs that this is an extremely consequential election. And we should be doing our public service role that it's not so much about chasing the latest clicks and the latest horse race coverage, but rather to make sure that we're getting the stakes of the race across to people. You know, people think that the economy was -- is not doing well. You know, do our public service mission, which is to make sure as sure as we can that we have an informed electorate. Whose fault is that? Well, it's partly the fault of the media. And I think that that ought to be rectified. AMANPOUR: Margaret Sullivan, thank you so much indeed for joining us. SULLIVAN: Thank you very much for having me. (END VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: And of course, over here, the other side of the pond, whether in the halls of power or on the streets, people are really watching not just the coverage, but in anticipation of the results of this American election. You're watching THE AMANPOUR HOUR. And just ahead going to desperate lengths in dire straits. A look back at my reporting from Sarajevo, where people dodged sniper fire and arrest to find food. Why it's so painfully relevant today. [11:43:48] (COMMERCIAL BREAK) AMANPOUR: Welcome back. How desperate would you have to be to risk your life for food or water? Millions are having to make those life and death decisions in Gaza today. And as I witnessed back in the 1990s, amid the four-year siege of Sarajevo, people were braving sniper fire for the chance to break free and find whatever fresh food they could. It was the longest siege in modern history, and it ended 28 years ago this week. The desperation then is a painful mirror of today's crisis in Gaza, where half-a-million face famine, more than 100 have just been killed and hundreds injured. Some trampled in a chaotic incident while trying to get any scraps from a rare aid distribution convoy. And a sanitation crisis is spreading disease there. So it's indeed striking now to look back at Sarajevo and remember. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: In the twos and threes, Bosnians come to police headquarters in one of Sarajevo's frontline villages. They come to sign out of their city. People desperate enough now to risk everything, even their lives on a personal quest to break their nine-month siege. [11:49:41] AMANPOUR: Once outside their on their own, creeping along in the pitch black to a final check point. Freedom is just across the airport. If they could only make it over 500 yards of open frontline territory. It's the longest journey they'll ever make. They are in constant danger from Serb shells and snipers. In pairs, they make the final dash, but it's not just the Serbs they face. It's the U.N. soldiers who control the airport. Caught in the search lights, they dive for cover. The U.N. is under orders to prevent this traffic. Undaunted, the civilian stay hidden for a few seconds before getting up and running off again. But by this time, the U.N. search light have attracted the snipers. Two people have been killed in the past two weeks. Those who do make it past the Serbs meet the French at the airport perimeter. Their armored vehicles are on patrol all night and the soldiers are told to catch the Sarajevans and turn them back. "Send everyone back behind the fence," says this radio message from the spotters on the control tower. It's a cruel fate for people who have risked so much. A woman stands in the freezing, driving snow and pleads to be let through. Three people accord. They're taken to the armored vehicle and searched. All they want is to go across to free territory and buy food for their families. It's not easy for the soldiers either. It's our most difficult missions says this commander. It's hard to turn back women, men, and children who are cold and hungry. The airport is officially off-limits to all the Bosnians who come to this darkened sign out room desperate to get out. It's been that way ever since the Serbs handed back control of the airstrip to the U.N. in July. And the people who come here resent the U.N.'s control. But the U.N. says it has to stop Bosnians bringing weapons across the airport. They say several hundred civilians manage to make it past them every night. "It's the first time and the last time I do it," says Eva. "It's just too frightening." She and her friends have come back from the other side. They weren't trying to escape. They were just trying to buy some food. Food they can't get in Sarajevo. A young mother brought back some bananas and some butter. These luxuries will provide a month of happiness for her and her two young children. A father holds a half-rotten apple. For this, he has risked his life. "My daughter hasn't seen apples since the beginning of the war," he says. I was forced to do it. Forced to face the winter cold, the Serbs, the French, forced to take their lives in their hands just to survive. (END VIDEOTAPE) AMANPOUR: And that apple still gets to me all these years later. The basic right to food and to water is an international right, denying people under siege is against international law. It was then and it remains so today. When we come back, journalist Lawrence wright on his new HBO documentary, "God Save Texas" and why both Texas and the whole nation are at an inflection point in history. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) LAWRENCE WRIGHT, JOURNALIST: We're marching into a very dangerous couple of months right ahead of us. America, the future of our country is going to be determined I'm convinced by the elections. (END VIDEO CLIP) [11:53:08] (COMMERCIAL BREAK) AMANPOUR: Welcome back to the program. This week saw former and current presidents at the Texas border, where the immigration crisis is a top election issue. Now, from the oil and gas industry to the criminal justice system, a new HBO documentary, "God Save Texas", looks at that often-dark history of the Lone Star State. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When I was a kid her in Huntsville, there were 11 prisons. Now there's a hundred and something. What's going on? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's about money. It's industry. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It seemed like the prisons just had this gravitational inevitability to it. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Texas is at the back of killing innocent men. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What I saw is an unfolding tragedy, created a kind of panic in me. (END VIDEO CLIP) AMANPOUR: It's an adaptation of the book by the same name by Pulitzer prize-winning author and journalist Lawrence Wright. He's produced some of the most definitive investigations of our time, including on the 9/11 attacks, the Camp David Accords, and the COVD pandemic. He told me why Texas is so emblematic of the struggles at play in America today. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) AMANPOUR: How should the rest of the world where I am, just look at America today, whether it be Texas, which is often a bellwether of certain politics; Alabama, the IVF ruling -- you know, all the stuff that's going on just the Republicans, the Trump Republicans preventing aid to support a fledgling democracy fighting for its life. How should we be thinking about this and where does Texas come into it? WRIGHT: Well, the country is at an inflection point. I mean, we're marching into a very dangerous couple of months right ahead of us. And I'm no prophet on this. I can't tell you what's going to happen, but America, the future of our country is going to be determined, I'm convinced by the elections. And the thing that one can hope is, you know, this country is constantly changing. When I was a kid, Texas was blue and California was red. You know, these things can change. [11:59:51] WRIGHT: And with Texas which is the future of America because it's growing so fast and by the year 2050 is projected to be the size of California and New York combined. So it will be decisive in American politics. (END VIDEO CLIP) AMANPOUR: And "God Save Texas" is streaming now on HBO, which is a part of CNN's parent company. And you can watch the rest of that conversation at amanpour.com. And don't forget, you can find all of our shows online as podcasts, at CNN.com/podcast, and on all major platforms. I'm Christiane Amanpour in London. Thanks for watching and I'll see you again next week.