A Star is Born
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Hey there, Ryan Reynolds here. It's a new year and you know what that means. No, not the diet. Resolutions.

A way for us all to try and do a little bit better than we did last year. And my resolution, unlike big wireless, is to not be a raging a**hole and raise the price of wireless on you every chance I get. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. $45 upfront payment required, equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes on unlimited. See mintmobile.com for details. It's Tuesday, January 7th, right now on CNN This Morning.

"We have a new star. A star is born, Elon." Musk making waves, the world's richest man dipping his toes into international politics. Plus, "There is some merit to a one-bill strategy, and there's good arguments for the two-bill." One bill or two, Republicans already at odds about the best way to get Donald Trump's agenda passed through Congress. And, "Tough guy business, and this man is the toughest, most resilient human being." From the octagon of the boardroom, one of Donald Trump's closest allies has a new role with Meta.

And later, pandemonium! At least someone is having fun frolicking in the snow that blanketed DC. All right, 6 a.m. here on the East Coast. Let's have a look at Palm Beach, Florida. You know why we're showing you that this morning. Good morning, everyone. I'm Casey Hunt. It's wonderful to have you with us.

So starting next week, the newly seated Senate will begin holding confirmation hearings for Donald Trump's cabinet picks, and among them is Florida Senator Marco Rubio, who is Trump's choice to become the next Secretary of State, America's official top diplomat.

But in recent weeks, another Trump ally, Elon Musk, has been the one trying to interact with world leaders. The world's richest man, the owner of the social media platform X, has been busy, as he always is, online. He has posted dozens of times about foreign affairs. The topics have included promoting a far-right political party in Germany, calling for Britain's prime minister to resign, and alleging Britain's leaders covered up sexual abuse cases.

At one point, Musk even put up a poll. He wondered if, quote, America should liberate the people of Britain from their tyrannical government, end quote. Without calling out Musk by name, Britain's prime minister said this about the recent firestorm generated online. Those that are spreading lies and misinformation as far and as wide as possible, they're not interested in victims. They're interested in themselves.

Trump has stayed mostly silent on the latest international dispute involving Musk, who is of course one of his biggest donors and advisors. But he does seem to be reveling in the downfall of Canada's liberal leader, Justin Trudeau, who just announced he's stepping down as prime minister. Trump posting after the announcement once again, referring to Canada as the 51st state and wondering what it would be like, quote, if Canada merged with the U.S.,

With Trump now a little under two weeks away from returning to office, some American allies are left wondering what this all means for diplomacy in the years ahead. Ten years ago, if we'd been told that the owner of the largest social media networks would support an international reactionary movement and directly intervene in elections, including Germany, who would have believed it? This is the world we live in, in which we have to conduct diplomacy.

Musk responded to those comments from France's president by accusing Britain's prime minister of acting against Trump's bid for re-election.

Our panel is here to talk about all of it. Solon Kendo-Young, CNN political analyst, White House reporter for The New York Times. Alex Thompson, CNN political analyst, national political reporter at Axios. Kate Bedingfield, CNN political commentator, former Biden White House communications director. And Brad Todd, CNN political commentator and Republican strategist. Welcome to all of you. Thank you so much for being here. Alex Thompson, at what point is it Elon Musk who seems to be acting as though he is, if not

you know, President of the United States and at least Secretary of State or something. I mean, at what point does this get to be too much for Donald Trump?

I don't think they can really separate themselves at this point. I mean, he wrote a $200 million check to elect Donald Trump. He has billions and billions of dollars of government contracts. He also has billions and billions of dollars of businesses all over the world. And as was noted, he has a social media company where he can basically, at a press of a button at 2.51 a.m., basically just cause an international incident.

So they are going to be intertwined these next four years. There's no way of getting out of it. So Maggie Haberman, I was talking with Kara Swisher on her podcast, and she had something a little bit interesting to say about how Donald Trump may be feeling about Elon at the moment. Let's watch what Maggie said. A longtime Trump friend said something to me recently about how, you know, Trump is a one ring circus. I'm not sure that Musk has figured that out yet. And, you know, Trump does everything

complain a bit to people about how Musk is around a lot. I mean, Brad Todd. You know, the richest man in the world, whoever that has been at every stage, has always had a lot of influence in global affairs. They just didn't own a social media company to tell us about it. And I remember when a lot of liberals, especially in this country, mocked Elon and said he overpaid for Twitter and said it was a mistake. But it turns out he's got a lot out of it, and I think he'll continue to get a lot out of it.

He might have lost some money, but what he gained instead. He didn't need money, but he did need influence. And he got that, I think, out of that purchase. Trump is somewhat of a one-ring circus. That's a pretty good description of it, however. But he does need allies. And I remember when people mocked the kind of people Trump had around him and said, why didn't he get the best people as he promised? Well, Elon Musk is one of the brightest people in commerce in America. And so I think most people would have confidence that he's around him. Well,

- Well, but America also needs allies. And so it's just interesting, is there any strategic, any grand strategic vision behind what Musk and Trump are doing here? Are they ultimately trying to strengthen America's hand? Are they thinking about how the government's in power in some of these places could potentially be a benefit to the United States of America when we need them? I mean, that's the thing about global affairs. It's not always as simple as sending a tweet. I know that that may seem shocking in this day and age, but it is not actually always as simple as sending a tweet.

So, you know, it's interesting to me. And I think this question of whether they can be separated. One, you obviously have the Trump ego question. To what point does Trump look up and say, wait a minute, this guy is sucking up more oxygen than I want him to be sucking up. And then two, you know, do we reach a point where you can see a strategic divide between what Trump and his team, Rubio et al., are trying to do?

And what Musk is doing. So one of the other pieces of this, and this has a little bit to do with, or a lot to do with domestic politics in addition to international politics, but Steve Bannon, Zolan, really went after Musk over the weekend. Let's watch what he had to say. And we'll talk about it on the other side. Take a look. He's got a glass jaw. He can't take, because of the, I don't know, the autism or where he's on the spectrum, he's clearly not. He's got the maturity of an 11-year-old. You can tell that. One of his weaknesses is,

is that he needs to be loved. He needs the masses to love him. You can tell he's on the stage. He needs that glory. - And again, he was talking there about Elon Musk saying that he has a glass jaw. And this is of course one of Donald Trump's longtime supporters as well. - Yeah, as we kind of continue here through this new Trump era, it'll be interesting to see just how various Trump allies as well continue to react to Elon Musk's growing influence.

And that is a growing influence. Look, he seems to be sort of copying a playbook that he used previously when it came to the U.S. election, but now in Canada, Germany, as well as the U.K. But you were saying, you know, is there a strategy here?

Elon's also unpredictable at times when you're firing off dozens of tweets in a matter of days about these different elections, but also meeting with the head of Reform UK at Mar-a-Lago, seemingly backing him, but then just hours later flip-flopping on support as well. This is why it's hard to track the positions of somebody with this kind of influence when they seem to just be firing off tweets

on a myriad of policy positions that impact foreign affairs throughout the world. - You know, you just, you talking about it, it strikes me how similar Elon and Donald Trump are. I mean, talk about a guy with a glass jaw who really wants to be loved and is firing off tweets over at all times of day about various policies and you don't really know where they stand. I think in some ways they're made for each other.

But Elon Musk is a rookie at politics, and he's also a very bright man. He's going to learn politics quickly. The mistakes he's making now about being done two different opposite tweets within two hours, that's going to change. He'll get better at this this time. The thing to watch moving forward as well, we've seen the tweets. Will you see the money as well in some of these other elections? Elon spent $277 million in American elections.

you know, this past time around. Will we start to see the money backing some of these candidates as well overseas? Kate, one of the things that Elon Musk has right now with Donald Trump is proximity. We've written about this, you know, $2,000 a night cottage he's staying at in Mar-a-Lago, so he has continued access. That's going to change when Trump goes to the West Wing now? Presumably. What would...

Trump have to give Musk to maintain that proximity? Is it an office in the West Wing? I mean... Maybe, although I don't think there has to be. Actually, in the case of Musk, I don't know if there has to be physical proximity that he needs an office in the West Wing. He needs his cell phone number. He needs a way to directly reach him that goes around the phalanx of people who are around any president of the United States to prevent stray voltage from coming in. So as long as he has a direct electronic line to Trump,

- He'll be able to reach them. - You know, I hear the Waldorf Astoria Hotel is for sale and might need someone to buy it on Pennsylvania Avenue. So maybe that could become the Musk Hotel.

Well, if he does that, you heard it. We'll give you credit for that actually happening. All right, coming up here on CNN this morning, Donald Trump's fixation on Greenland continues. He is now sending his son to the Danish territory and once again flirting with the idea of controlling it. Plus, certifying her election loss, Vice President Kamala Harris' message about American democracy. And the president-elect,

promised to pardon January 6th rioters, but some of his allies say not everyone convicted should be treated the same way. It's going to be a call to the president has to make. My assumption is that they'll look at these on a case-by-case basis.

I'm CNN tech reporter Claire Duffy. This week on the podcast, Terms of Service. Last April, following years of concerns from lawmakers that TikTok could pose a national security risk, President Biden signed a law that would ban the app in the United States.

Unless its owner sold it to a non-Chinese company. TikTok challenged the law, saying it violates the First Amendment. The United States government has never banned a social media app before. Follow CNN's Terms of Service wherever you get your podcasts. Donald J. Trump of the state of Florida has received 312 votes. Kamala D. Harris. It's like attending your own funeral. And even the mourners are like...

Vice President Kamala Harris, serving in her role as president of the Senate, presided over Congress as they certified the election that she lost. Monday's events on The Hill.

It's an understatement to say that they stood in stark contrast to what happened four years ago when a violent mob stormed the Capitol to contest Joe Biden's 2020 electoral victory. Harris telling reporters that what took place yesterday, a peaceful transfer of power, should be the norm. And today I did what I have done my entire career, which is take seriously the oath that I have taken many times to support and defend the Constitution of the United States.

which included today performing my constitutional duties to ensure that the people of America, the voters of America, will have their votes counted, that those votes matter, and that they will determine then the outcome of an election.

Kate Bedingfield, a pretty striking moment there where she had to say the exact count Donald J. Trump received and then Kamala Harris received. But worth underscoring and stopping to say, okay, look, we went back to the way that this is supposed to go. Yeah, it sent, I think, an incredibly important message about the durability of democracy. It was obviously just on a human level, you can imagine, that was not easy for her. I think she did it with a lot of grace. How

having the entire chamber stand and applaud your opponent's victory, I think, brutal. But what we didn't see in the clip with Jon Stewart there is the chamber also stood and applauded her, too. And I thought that was a really nice moment of kind of acknowledging. There it is right there. Yeah, there we go. Which I thought was a really nice and kind of moving moment yesterday. But yes, it sent an incredibly important message about what America stands for. And I thought in a really tough moment, she was incredibly graceful. Yeah, I think we should note it was half-true.

the chamber. Half the chamber also applauding Donald Trump. Brad Todd, Mike Pence wrote yesterday on X specifically commending Kamala Harris, saying that it was particularly admirable that the vice president would preside over the certification of a presidential election that she lost. He has not

spoken so publicly as we have seen the president-elect become so throughout this transition, but it's pretty clear how he feels about what happened on January 6th, 2021. How did you take in what we saw yesterday? Well, it ought to be the norm. Dan Quayle, of course, had to do it in 1992 after the '92 election. Al Gore had to do it in 2000. They'd both been on the ticket that lost and then had to certify their loss. So what Kamala Harris did yesterday was not exemplary. I thought one thing

I did note was this was the first Republican presidential victory certification that had no Democratic member of Congress protesting since 1988. I think we've lost that a little bit. In all the stain that was January 6th, we've lost the fact that

protesting these losses has become the norm. You know, Jesse Jackson Jr. did it in 2000 when George Bush was elected. John Lewis and Barbara Boxer did it in 2004 after George Bush was reelected. Perhaps we can move past where that becomes the norm. I mean, I would just... Yeah. Those are like constitutional procedures. Like there's provisions in the Constitution that allow for objections. There aren't... Sure. There aren't provisions in the Constitution to do what Donald Trump did on January 6th, right?

Yeah, that's correct. But if you accept the loss, and I think, by the way, the Pennsylvania objections were in rightful stead in 2021, too. But if you accept the loss, then you want this to be a purely perfunctory ceremonial thing. I think you have to look backward and see when did these objections start. And I think you have to say they started in 2000. Well, but Brad, I mean...

This was taken in 2021 to a level that we, I mean, this is the interruption of the peaceful transfer of power, which these objections were not. And they, you know, Democrats clearly have like, okay, then we're not going to, we're not going to even take those procedural steps based on, you know, what, where this was taken. I mean. Completely. It's a stain on Donald Trump's legacy and it should be forever. But I think we, the fact, as we celebrate the peaceful transfer and the acceptance of defeat, I think we need to rewind the tape and conclude that perhaps,

This began further back. - All right, so coming up here after the break, Facebook's parent company has a new board member. It is a close Donald Trump ally. It's taking place just two weeks before Trump takes office. Plus, the snow might be over for now. Icy temperatures though, moving in. - Washington, DC hit by winter snowstorm. That headline again, hell freezes over.

All right, welcome back. The dangerous snow, sleet, and ice that has blanketed much of the country. It's mostly moving out, but frigid temperatures are moving in and conditions are still hazardous. Bleep indeed. So that's black ice on the roads in Kansas City. It forced this driver to jump from the car as it exited the freeway. Thankfully, she was not hurt.

The incoming freezing temperatures are going to lock in that snow and ice on the ground. So everyone should be prepared for more of this. Let's get to our meteorologist, our weatherman, Derek Van Dam. Derek, I mean. How they had the inclination to jump out of the car at that last second is incredible. Quick reflexes. So props to that person. Yeah, that is an ice skating rink, right? And I don't see the conditions on the roads in Kansas City where that video came from getting any better anytime soon, right? Like this is what it feels like.

feels like as you step outside in Kansas City. Negative 12 degrees. Look how cold it is in DC this morning. 13. This is all thanks to the hefty snowpack from the last snowstorm, which, by the way, dumped over six inches or more of snow over a thousand mile plus stretch

from Kansas City all the way to the nation's capital. Daytime highs today really not edging much above freezing. And of course, with the ice and the snow comes the power outages, nearly 200,000 customers without power. Guess what? The cold air sticks around. And the reason this is important is because it's going to set the stage for the potential of another snow and ice event, particularly across Texas, the southeast by Friday, and potentially the east coast by Saturday. More on that

through the course of the week. But the culprit is this low pressure system that's actually driving a strong wind event in Southern California. This is a particularly dangerous situation with extreme fire behavior and damaging winds expected for Ventura and Los Angeles counties again today. Casey.

All right. Keep an eye out for that. Derek Van Dam for us, Derek. Thank you. Really appreciate it. All right. Still ahead here on CNN this morning, Donald Trump Jr. is heading to Greenland. Why he's visiting the Danish territory, which his dad wants the U.S. to control. Plus, one big beautiful bill or two? Donald Trump and his allies debate how to turn his election promises into political reality.

If we're going to do a single bill, including the tax cuts, we need to get started quickly. We need to get started quickly anyway, but that's going to be very, very complicated.

all right welcome back with donald trump's election victory now certified his political allies are trying to figure out how they're going to make his agenda law with incredibly tight majorities in congress on wednesday the president-elect will meet with republican senate conference in washington trump recently agreed with house republicans about pushing what he's called quote one big beautiful bill end quote packed with his legislative priorities

But some of his Senate allies are worried that approach could slow down their other goals. Is it a risk to put on one big bill? I think it's a risk to our country to delay border security. So if you're a tax cutting person, which I understand, and you're holding the border bill hostage, I think that's a dangerous thing. Now the president-elect seems to be opening the door to doing more than one bill if it means getting everything he wants.

I would prefer one, but I will do whatever needs to be done to get it passed. And, you know, we have a lot of respect for Senator Thune, as you know. He may have a little bit of a different view of it. I heard other senators yesterday, including Lindsey, talking about it. They prefer it the other way. So I'm open. I'm open to either way, as long as we get something passed as quickly as possible.

- Panel's back. Brad Todd, when the rubber meets the road here, the politics of this are incredibly complicated and there are differences between the House and the Senate in getting this done. And my understanding is that there's not insignificant pressure

around the immigration piece from Trump's own circle about trying to do something on that first. What do you think is next here? Well, I think a lot of things on immigration could be done in executive order. Part of this because a lot of the bad policy Joe Biden put in place was done by executive order can be reversed. And so I think that the White House should declare victory with a lot of executive orders on immigration first and then move into reconciliation to get serious about the tax cuts while they have

And if Republicans don't keep the current tax rates, then every American who pays taxes is going to pay more. That's a very easy message to sell. It's a very easy message to deliver. And I think that we need to get on that business right away. Well, the problem with that, there are divisions not just between the House and Senate. There are also divisions within Trump's team. Trump's incoming boarder czar has said that he wants...

to have the border bill and that funding piece passed as soon as possible because, yes, you can do all those executive orders, but if you want to have the biggest deportation effort in American history, you need money. It will cost billions and billions of dollars, and they don't have that right now. So let's look at one of these. This is a Democrat in the House who, they may play some role in this, especially considering what many of them view as a mandate that Republicans have. Just watch what they have to say.

They have a responsibility to govern because they have the technical majority. Of course, whenever anything has gotten done over the past two years, it's been because Democrats have stepped up.

So Kate, fact check true, they've needed Democrats to do things. How much pressure are Democrats going to be under to help get some of this stuff over the finish line, considering what we saw electorally? I think there will be some pressure on, particularly on the issues that were dominant in the election on immigration. I think a lot of these moderate Democrats are going to take a hard look at whatever ultimately gets proposed on immigration and make decisions about whether it's good politics for them to support it.

I don't think there is writ large a mandate for these Democrats or they're going to feel pressure to help Trump simply to seem like they're being helpful and seem like they're trying to be efficient. I mean, look, if there's any political lesson to take from dysfunction on the Hill over the last few years, it's that the Republicans actually didn't really pay a political price for the dysfunction and the gridlock that they were responsible for. So I

I think that there will be pressure on the Democrats on individual issues to show that they're delivering at home. I don't think that Democrats should feel like there's an enormous amount of pressure, um, um,

to be efficient for efficiency's sake, unfortunately. The pressure does seem to be on Republicans and the president-elect here. I mean, when you have, particularly when you have something like immigration energy, he had such ambitious, sprawling proposals that do involve, by the way, money as well. There's not enough detention capacity for mass deportations right now in the country. And

And my reporting suggests also that the president's team is aware of this, aware of the slim majority in Congress. And right now you have a group of officials at Mar-a-Lago that for weeks have been working on executive orders, on executive action. Still details, they're working it out, but that could fill in the void of congressional action on some of these issues. And if it is a two-bill system, it'll be interesting to see, do you emphasize immigration and energy first, or do you go with tax cuts as well? What gets left behind?

Punchbowl's also reporting this morning, Alex, that Senator John Fetterman is co-sponsoring the Lake and Riley Act, of course, in response to the death of Lake and Riley.

Yeah, well, I think people are already forgetting that the Democratic nominee ran on one of the most hawkish border policy a Democrat has run on in a long time, including $100 million for the wall, including huge beefs in border security. And the Democrats' lesson, at least Democrats I talk to right now, is that it wasn't enough.

So if you have a bill come up that is pretty hawkish on immigration, a lot of Democrats, including John Fetterman, are going to be under a lot of pressure to vote for it. Three-fourths of the country trust Republicans on immigration right now compared to Democrats. And you have about a dozen to 15 Democrats who are in seats. Donald Trump won.

They're also going to want to prove that they're willing to cooperate with him, I think, on tax rates and on immigration. Well, right, because the trust will start to erode once Trump and the Republicans are in power and people feel like they aren't seeing enough of what they were promised on the campaign trail. So that clock will be ticking for Trump and the Republicans, too.

All right, let's turn to this. It's been four years since yesterday since rioters attacked the US Capitol building in an attempt to stop Congress from certifying the 2020 presidential election results. And now with just two weeks until Donald Trump is sworn back into office,

Some of the individuals who've been dealing with the legal repercussions of that day could be looking at a reprieve. You promised to pardon those who attacked the Capitol on January 6th. Are you still vowing to follow through with that promise? We're looking at it right now, most likely, yeah. These people are living in hell. And I think it's very unfair. Most likely, I'll do it very quickly. I'm going to be acting very quickly.

within your first 100 days, first day? First day. But not all Republicans seem on board with a blanket pardon. I would suggest the president if he asked my opinion and he hasn't, is that he review them one by one by one by one. Rather than doing everything at once. Rather than doing one blanket pardon. Right, right. Every case is different.

Pretty interesting. Brad, we touched on this a little bit yesterday, but there you have John Kennedy, conservative Democrat,

Senator pushing back a little bit here. And Lindsey Graham also went on to say, we didn't play him there. He said, the people who beat up police officers, I put them in a different category than the others. Do you think we're going to see Trump pardon people who beat up police officers? Well, you know, Trump's talked about this several times. And sometimes when he talks about it, he says, I'm going to look at it case by case. And the ones that are really bad are

bad actors are not gonna pardon us that's I think the date the view that will carry the day I don't think Stuart Rhodes or Enrique Terrio or people who beat up police officers who grabbed a police shield and broke a window I don't think those people are going to be pardoned I think people who maybe worse were convicted for pled guilty to parading without a permit or demonstrating inside the capital because in in violation the capital rules they kill pride pardon some others at those folks and I don't think it will be that controversial when he does

But I think if he were to pardon Stuart Rhodes or Enrique Terrio or any of the instigators from the Oath Keepers or... Yeah, I mean, Terrio asked Trump for a pardon yesterday. I think those pardons will be controversial, and they should be. I mean, it's telling that you still don't know. I mean, we have no idea how far he's going to go with this. And there is sort of a feeling...

on many issues within the Trump orbit of this sort of invincibility, given all the things that he overcame over the last two years, lawsuits, assassination attempts, everything else. And there's definitely a feeling of sort of exuberance that, well, just screw it. Like, let's just do everything that we said we were going to do. Yeah, but the last conversation we were just having is related to this one, right? Because politics is all intertwined and he's ultimately got to get votes for his

agenda and so yes I I certainly agree that there seems to be a sense of there there's a feeling of invincibility I'm that comes from after winning an election but the reality of vote counting on the hill as we just discussed is going to be very challenging and doing something like this that's incredibly controversial I

Well, controversial. Right out of the gate, when you're trying to count votes on the things you promised you would do for the American people, it does not make a whole lot of sense. Isn't this the unbettable tension, right? All four new presidents have this desire to sort of settle scores versus to increase their popularity. All of them? I mean, Donald Trump in particular. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know.

Campaigns are pretty bruising things. And I think there is an urge in politics to settle scores. It comes with him more than others, perhaps. But he does want to be popular and he does want his agenda to be popular. He's also said that he would do this early and prioritize it. And this does get more complicated when you do it on an individual basis.

The easiest way to do a pardon action quickly, like on day one, is to issue a sweeping categorical pardon. So if you're going to start to disperse it and look at each individual crime, it's going to take longer. And now you start to have pressure from the base after you committed to doing this early on.

Yeah. And I mean, I think I keep flashing back as well to that moment at that rally in, I believe it was Ohio, where he stands there as they play, you know, Please Rise for the national anthem sung by the January 6th. What?

What is the word? No, it's the hostages. The unfairly, yes. Yes, yes. He just played it again at Mar-a-Lago. The tension between the windshield and the rearview mirror for Donald Trump, though, may determine how successful the first year of his presidency is. Yeah, as...

We said this yesterday on the show that politics is about the future, right? In theory. All right, straight ahead here on CNN This Morning, three new board members appointed at META. One of them, Dana White, the chief executive of the UFC, plus the late President Jimmy Carter, making his final journey to the nation's capital.

He talked to me like you and I are talking and it was first surreal because he was the president of the most powerful country in the world but he talked on a genuine one-to-one level. His humility is really important to me you know it never got to his head being the president. How I hope he's remembered is that he's remembered for who he is that you know the integrity, truthfulness,

All those qualities we like to pretend like all our presidents have and almost none of them do. The nation honoring President Jimmy Carter, who will return to Washington for the last time today. The 39th president of the United States will lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda, where the public will be able to visit. This is a live look at the former president right now. His remains will return to Georgia to be buried on Thursday alongside his wife of 77 years, Rosalynn.

But it's here in D.C. where Carter served his nation for four at times tumultuous years and where he arrived with promises of change and compassion. In the beginning, Jimmy Carter's campaign was a lonely one. But through the months, more and more people recognized him as a new leader, a man who will change the way this country is run, a competent man who can make our government open and efficient, but above all, an understanding man.

who can make ours a government of the people once again. Jimmy Carter, a leader for a change. All right, joining us now is former U.S. Ambassador to the European Union, Stuart Eisenstadt. He also served as Chief White House Domestic Policy Advisor to President Jimmy Carter. Mr. Ambassador, thank you so much for joining us this morning. Casey, thank you for having me.

I'd like to start just with your reflections there about the former president. And I was actually struck by

by that one person in Plains, Georgia, who talked about the integrity of former President Carter. And you wrote about this, and let me just read a little bit of what you said. "Conventional wisdom holds that Jimmy Carter was a failure as president, redeemed only by his philanthropy and efforts to promote democracy in his post-presidential years.

This is palpably wrong. Why is Carter's presidency remembered so harshly? It is due in part to his unorthodox approach to the presidency. He believed he could park politics at the Oval Office door and procure another term by concentrating on doing the right thing, forgetting that a president must be politician in chief. Talk a little bit about the man that you knew and his focus on doing the right thing.

Well, first Casey, I've literally known him for 55 years. I was his policy director when he ran for governor and then for president and then as chief domestic advisor. And he had an iron discipline.

and a determination to tackle issues which others had shied away from. Like, for example, the Panama Canal, like granting amnesty the first day to Vietnam draft evaders, so we put that wound behind us. Tackling energy, which was a hugely difficult problem. We inherited an energy situation in which we were importing more than 50% of our oil,

Now we are the biggest producer of oil and natural gas. It's because of his three energy bills. He is a great environmentalist. He doubled the size of our national park. And he deregulated whole industries, rail, airlines, trucks.

telecommunications. We wouldn't have CNN today as we know it without that. And even the beer industry, which gave rise to all the craft industries. And then abroad, he commanded the hard power of building up our military after Vietnam and the soft power of human rights.

And all the weapons systems, Casey, which President Reagan implemented and gets credit for somehow bringing the Soviet Union to its knees, and it's fine that he did. But each one of them began with President Carter. The China normalization, the Panama Canal Treaty, and then the real cherry on the cake was the 13 days at Camp David ironing out the first...

peace agreement between Israel and its Arab neighbors. And that is a peace agreement, Casey, that has lasted for 45 years, even through this Gaza war. And those are things that are important. So what I really hope is that while his post-presidency obviously was spectacular,

that we look back and redeem his presidency and see it as a very important, impactful, one-term presidency that had lasting impacts. Unfortunately, many of the things that he put in place

only blossomed after he left office, like, for example, tackling inflation through having Paul Volcker raise interest rates in an election year. It was one of the things that lost in the election, but it was important for the country. Reagan and the country benefited when interest rates dropped like a rock, but not too early enough to help

So these are all things that I think are coming together during this solid moment. For me, it's a bittersweet moment. I'll be seeing his casket in the U.S. Capitol tonight and then again tomorrow. And it brings back a rush of memories from the time when he was Jimmy Who at 1% in the polls. We put him on What's My Line?

Not one person knew that he was the governor of Georgia. He came an awful long way through sheer determination and a message. It was an anti-Watergate message. It was cleaning up Washington. It was bringing ethics to Washington after Watergate. And that was a message that resonated in the primaries and in the general election against President Boynton.

Mr. Ambassador, briefly, his marriage to his wife Rosalynn also set an example that is still worth looking at today, no? I went down to Plains, Casey, for his 75th anniversary, and it was a remarkable celebration. He, of course, was married a total of 77 years, but to see them 75 years out,

hand in hand, looking at each other with great love was remarkable. It's a marriage that really lasted, but importantly also, Casey, she herself was a unique First Lady. She was the first to have a staff in the East Wing. She was the first to draft her own legislation, community mental health. She was the second next to Eleanor Roosevelt to testify in Congress.

And she was sent on an early mission by the president to Latin America to tell Latin America that a new day was coming of human rights. And she was not going to meet with and have teas with the first ladies of Latin America. She met with the leaders and she gave them a very harsh message. We're going to cut your arms off unless you speak.

improve your human rights record. And that resulted in thousands of political prisoners getting out and ending up with democracies coming. So yes, it was a marriage, but it was also a partnership during the administration. All right. Ambassador Stuart Eisenstadt, sir, so grateful to have your perspectives and reflections on the show today. And I know there will be many emotions as we honor President Carter. I'm thinking of you and everyone who knew him. Thank you. Thank you, Casey.

All right, 54 minutes past the hour. Here's your morning roundup. Lawyers for Donald Trump want to keep the public from seeing special counsel Jack Smith's final report on the federal investigations into the president-elect. They are threatening to take legal action if it's released. According to a court filing from Smith overnight, Attorney General Merrick Garland will decide whether any portion of the report is to be made public.

Tracking a developing story at this hour, JetBlue discovers two bodies in a plane's landing gear at Fort Lauderdale's airport. The airline says crews found them during a post-flight inspection last night. How they got there is under investigation.

And Donald Trump is talking about Greenland again. This time he says his son, Donald Trump Jr., will travel there. Trump Sr. recently revived his push for the U.S. to take control of the Danish territory, something that he had floated during his first administration. The concept came up and I said, certainly I'd be strategically it's interesting and we'd be interested, but we'll talk to them a little bit. It's not number one on the burner, I can tell you that.

So wait, Brad Todd, why does Canada get to be the 51st state but not Greenland? Greenland only has 50,000 people, so it would be certainly the most overrepresented state in the United States Senate if we were to add that Greenland in. But I don't know. Canada's more adjacent. I don't have a good answer for you, Casey. I'm all for Canada as the 51st state. Let's give Democrats significant electoral influence, including more elected officials in Congress, probably more...

margin in the popular vote. Great, Donald Trump. Terrific. Let's do it. One interesting thing about the Greenland thing is it actually isn't the first time that we've talked about this. Harry Truman tried to buy it for $100 million in gold in 1947. Now, that was much more about the Soviets and the Cold War politics. In this case, it seems to be a little bit more about Trump's obsession with energy and potentially drilling. And the competition over the Arctic as well. And just to...

sort of interest in territorial expansion as well. It's not just Greenland. We've also heard comments on the Panama Canal as well. Yeah, well, and apparently the Danes have changed their royal crest for the first time in hundreds of years to make Greenland more prominent. So I don't think they're interesting in giving it up. Exactly. All right, let's turn now to Silicon Valley, where Facebook's parent company, Meta, is getting a new board member. UFC and close Donald Trump ally, CEO, excuse me, and close Donald Trump ally Dana White is

Meta tapping White for just two weeks before Trump takes office amid what seems to be a broader ideological shift to the right within the top ranks at Meta, the tech giant recently donating to Trump's inaugural fund. White, of course, emerged as a key voice for Trump on the campaign trail and used his UFC connections to leverage appearances for Trump on podcasts that were popular with thousands of young men. Trump even picked White to introduce him at the RNC this summer and had him on stage for his victory speech.

So Alex Thompson now on the board of Meta.

There are a number of things that show the way Meta feels it has to operate in this new Trump-driven universe. - Yeah, they just had their sort of center-left UK head of policy. He took a backseat, and now you have someone who was a very prominent ally of people like Brett Kavanaugh and the Bush administration as head of that policy. Mark Zuckerberg went down to Mar-a-Lago. Trump played the January 6th Star-Spangled Banner in front of him.

And it is clearly an attempt. They know that Donald Trump is a highly transactional person, and that's why you see all these moves. - I'm reminded of, I was at that press conference that the president-elect had a couple weeks ago, where he had a comment where he said, "The first time around when I won election, "nobody wanted anything to do with me. "Now everybody's kind of coming

Everybody wants to be my friend. Everybody wants to be my friend. This is normal. But you're seeing that now, too. It is interesting how Meta is doing it in a variety of ways here. Vernon Jordan was a close friend of Bill Clinton's who prospered wildly with corporate contracts and board memberships after Bill Clinton became president. This is normal. When a president takes over, companies who think they're in the bullseye regularly

regulation suddenly find that president's friends. This is not anything. Yes, I agree, except the difference here is that Facebook has such a massive influence over how people in this country receive information. I mean, that is just, that is different than politically influential people cozying up to corporate leadership where they're trying to make money. This is a real tangible impact on how people in this country receive news and get information. And that, to me, is where the real, that

I mean, the other issue is significant, too. Republicans are ready to raise the alarm on some of that, too. We welcome Democrats, too, to the conversation. It also wasn't too long ago that a certain Dana White tried to broker an actual fight between Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk. I have a great sound bite that is too long to play now.

I forgot about it. You're totally right. You're totally right. All right, we're hitting 7 o'clock. But I do want to leave you with just a couple seconds of my favorite video today, which is the pandas enjoying the snow in Washington, D.C. They are having the most fun of any of us. Thanks to all of you for being with us this morning. I'm Casey Hunt. Don't go anywhere. CNN News Central starts right now.