CBS Evening News, 05/29/25
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From CBS News headquarters in New York, this is the CBS Evening News. Good evening, I'm John Dickerson. I'm Maurice Dubois. Americans say they are losing it.

losing the fight against inflation. In a new CBS News poll, more than three out of four told us their incomes are not keeping up with inflation. And nearly two out of three told us they are stressed about their finances. As for the overall economy, only 39% said it is good, but that is still a two-point improvement over last month and about where it was when President Trump took office. A lot of activity.

Little change. It's the same story in the courts. A day ago, the Court of International Trade ruled the president overstepped his authority with many of his tariffs. Today, a federal appeals court said the tariffs may stay in place as he challenges the decision. For many small businesses, Joling Kent tells us the verdict on those tariffs is already in. Joling.

Look, the last 24 hours have been a real roller coaster for American businesses, big and small. They're ensnared in this new legal drama when all they really want from President Trump is some certainty.

Molly Leonetti is the president of Claire V, which makes and sells handbags and accessories. This says masculine, feminine. This is one of our phrases. It manufactures many of its products here in Los Angeles, but some of the materials are imported from overseas and subject to President Trump's tariffs. Since April 2nd, the amount spent on tariffs has been over $100,000 thus far, and that's just in less than 60 days.

When we visited the warehouse this afternoon, Leonetti was cautiously optimistic after a federal court struck down President Trump's reciprocal tariffs. I wish I could say we would be jumping up and rejoicing, but we still remain in a state of heightened uncertainty, where it's very hard to project. It's hard to commit to inventory. We've had to put new hires that we'd budgeted for on hold. But that optimism was short-lived.

We just heard that an appeals court reinstated the tariffs. You almost want to laugh because it's just the constant...

breaking news alerts and the reversals. It's so hard to plan, right? And it's so hard to remain hopeful that some of these things will stick that seem to make sense. The latest CBS News poll found 53 percent of Americans expect the economy to be slowing or in a recession over the next year. In the last few months, we've seen a real slowdown. People are nervous. They're holding on to their savings and they're waiting to see what happens. How long can you absorb this for? For us,

Eight months, a year is really where we will have to really reevaluate our pricing and think about how we can shift things. We'll have to look at counter sourcing, counter development in new places to do what we can to try to offset it. Today, the Federal Appeals Court signaled it will move quickly on what it does next. And the White House has said if the Federal Appeals Court agrees with the Court of International Trade, the White House is prepared to take this all the way to the Supreme Court.

Jolene Kent in Los Angeles. Thank you. Now more of the top stories from around the world in the evening news roundup. Israel agreed today to a 60-day ceasefire with Hamas proposed by the United States. It would include the release of 10 living hostages and the remains of 18 others. Hamas said it is considering the proposal.

These images were captured yesterday when a village in the Swiss Alps was virtually wiped out. A huge chunk of a glacier broke loose and buried it. All 300 residents had evacuated last week after geologists warned an avalanche and rock slide were coming.

Federal judge in Boston is allowing Harvard to continue to enroll foreign students. The Trump administration had moved to block the university from bringing in students from overseas, partly over concerns about anti-Semitism. And Weijia Zhang is at the White House and reporting that Elon Musk's 130-day run as top budget and job-cutting advisor to the president will end tomorrow.

Elon Musk barreled into Washington with big plans to shrink government spending. This is the chainsaw for bureaucracy. But the world's richest man came up short. Musk initially predicted Doge could cut $2 trillion from the federal budget, then revise the number to $1 trillion before landing on a tiny fraction of that.

I'm excited to announce that we anticipate savings in FY26 from reduction of waste and fraud by $150 billion. Just days before leaving the administration, Musk told CBS Sunday morning even those savings could be impacted thanks to President Trump's so-called big, beautiful bill, contradicting the White House's claim that it will cut the deficit by $1.6 trillion. I was like...

disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decrease it,

and that reminds the work that the Doge team is doing. That work included targeting the jobs of over 100,000 federal workers, including Tom DiLiberto, a climate scientist who was fired from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in February. And you're basically crushing just hundreds and hundreds, thousands and thousands of dreams with these nonsense cuts that aren't saving anybody money. What kind of mark do you think Doge

will leave. It's not a mark, it's a stain. And it's clear that they came in with a giant amount of ego and a giant amount of not caring and not willing to learn about how the government actually works. Elon Musk announced he is leaving at the end of this month. Good riddance. Does that make you feel better or worse? I mean, it's sort of like the bull has finally left the China shop after he broke everything.

Weijia, you can feel and see Tom's pain is palpable there. What's he going to do now? Well, he's unemployed and he used the word crazy to describe his job hunt because he's competing against so many other federal workers who were also fired or took a buyout and even some current ones because Tom says they are looking for new work, seeing the writing on the wall. Weijia, what happens to Doge now?

Well, along with Elon Musk, several top Doge officials are also departing. But the White House insists the department is remaining intact and that cabinet members and the president will lead Doge's efforts. As for Musk, he will remain an unofficial advisor to Trump. Weijia Zhang at the White House. Thank you, Weijia. Those Doge cuts were supposed to remove fat from the federal budget. But they also eliminated some healthful foods for the kids and poor. Here's Janet Chamleon.

At Riverside High in Durham, North Carolina, the food is as fresh as can be. So the cilantro and everything in here, in this area, is coming from local farmers? Yes. We receive local shredded carrots, cucumbers, lettuce, because we feel that we need to support people in our own communities. Jim Keaton runs the district's nutrition plan and says much of this produce comes from local growers under a USDA program that's been cut by the Trump administration.

when you learned this funding was going away? Immediately, my thoughts were, "What are we going to do?" Because these are funds we use to provide local foods to kids. Some of that food is grown here at Pine Knot Farms, about an hour's drive from Riverside High.

With that funding, the farm sold $150,000 in produce last year to schools and to the local food bank. Linda Leach Hughes keeps the books. What will the loss of that income mean for you? It's devastating. If we do not have

this extra income coming in to help local folk in the community, then we will have to lay folk off. We can no longer employ folk. The produce grown here is also what the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina has relied on. President Amy Barrow says its share of aid, now lost, is $2 million. I don't understand. We're facing one of the worst hunger crisis in decades.

and now we're going to increase the need even more. The access to this food makes them not have to choose between the life-saving medicine they need and food for that month. The concern over who gets fed is especially felt by those who cultivate it. How are you going to make America great again if you're taking food out of the mouth of babies, senior citizens, nursing homes, rehab centers, hospitals, all of these

These agencies that are dependent on federal dollars. How are you going to make America great again? And the USDA has defended these cuts, saying this is a program started by the Biden administration to help farmers during the pandemic and that now it is no longer needed. Janet Chamblee, and thank you. Still ahead on the CBS Evening News, Alvin, Lonnie Quinn is tracking the first tropical storm of the Pacific season. And we'll have these seasons.

I'm Dr. John LaPuta on this dairy farm in rural Pennsylvania, and I'm going to be showing you how this is kind of a laboratory for the development of a vaccine against bird flu. I'm Mark Strassman in Flint, Michigan. Talk about a baby gift. Thousands of dollars in cash with no strings attached. Hear about a groundbreaking American program coming up on tonight's Eye on America. ♪♪

The Department of Health and Human Services has canceled a contract with Moderna to develop a bird flu vaccine for humans. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a vaccine skeptic. So far, the only people to come down with bird flu got it from animals. Dr. John LaPook tells us research is underway to keep the flu from mutating into a form that could spread person to person.

We went to a dairy farm in rural Pennsylvania to see how microbiologist Scott Hensley and his University of Pennsylvania team are trying to stay a step ahead of bird flu. A scenario may play out where the risk is very low, very low, and boom, all of a sudden we have a pandemic.

Bird flu has torn across dairy farms across the country, infecting 70 humans so far. While there's no evidence it is spreading person to person, that could change as the virus circulates and mutates. And if that mutation would arise, then we fear the virus might be able to transmit human to human. Through the air? Through the air, yeah. That's the fear. Hensley says slowing the spread of bird flu in cows could help lower the odds of that kind of pandemic-causing mutation.

So they designed an experimental messenger RNA vaccine, vaccinated two cows, and waited to see if it created an immune response. We were in the lab with Hensley to see if samples from the vaccinated cows contained antibodies against bird flu. If they did, these wells would turn blue. Yeah, so you can see the blue in these wells here. So there's antibody in the milk. So that means the vaccine worked. So it worked. It worked.

The next step was to ship the vaccinated cows to a biosecure USDA facility in Ames, Iowa, where they were intentionally exposed to bird flu. Aside from a brief mild drop in milk production, cows receiving the vaccine stayed healthy.

In contrast, the unvaccinated cows produced 75% less milk than usual, developed fever, and were less active. If we don't develop a vaccine pathway in animals, every year we'll be trying to stamp out

the virus. Dr. Andrew Hoffman is dean of the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine. Maybe there won't be a need for the vaccine, but the point of vaccine development isn't to wait until you absolutely need it right now with your hair on fire. The point is to have that ready to go. And we want to be ready to go. So, Dr. LaPook, can they use that vaccine on people if necessary?

You know, I just spoke a few minutes ago to Scott Hensley, who's the researcher who headed up this research, and he said if this vaccine works in cows, a vaccine that's essentially the same could also be tried in humans. To be clear, that's not what he and his team are doing.

And it's not the normal way of going and doing things. Dean Hoffman said you don't want to wait till your hair is on fire to come up with a vaccine. So how does that square with this decision made today? Well, we reached out to HHS and they said they had real safety considerations and concerns about the whole messenger RNA technology used to make the vaccine. Now, remember that this is the same technology that during the pandemic is estimated to have saved hundreds of thousands of lives in the United States and millions across the world. That's very important to be concerned about safety. But I would think this is a

perfect opportunity for this open transparency. Don't just say, you know, here's what we're going to do. I think a lot of us, me included, are interested in saying, what's the thinking behind that? Who had input? What were the pros? What were the cons? Do a deep dive. We can understand it. We want to hear the details, not just say, here's what we've decided. Yeah, show your work. Dr. LaPook, thank you.

A tornado touched down late this afternoon in Georgia, southeast of Atlanta. It crossed I-75 right in the path of cars and trucks. Lonnie Quinn has more about the severe weather and the birth of the first tropical storm of the Pacific hurricane season.

Okay, guys, you know, there's an important lesson here, and that is, look, our forecasting has gotten so much more precise over the last five, ten years, but it's never, ever going to be just perfect. In fact, look at this picture, some of that damage with that tornado. There was never a tornado watch anywhere today in Georgia, and yet it sparked up quickly. Yes, a warning was issued, but only moments before that kind of damage was done as the tornado pushed through. That line now pushes towards the mid-Atlantic, eventually into the northeast. That's for tomorrow and for Saturday.

wet weather there could be some flooding concerns and look at this picture did you see that rotating like tower of flames this is a huge fire that's burning right now over a hundred thousand acres this is in manitoba uh they've evacuated basically the entire area of manitoba because of it and when you see those sort of fire nato's half tornado half fire when those are created because that heat is generated so intensely it rises so fast other air has to weep

WHIP IN QUICKLY AND IT CREATES THAT TWIST AND YOU GET THOSE TORNADOES OUT THERE OR THOSE FIRE NATURALS. IT ALSO IS PUSHING THE SMOKE INTO OUR COUNTRY, PLACES LIKE MINNESOTA AND WISCONSIN COULD BE DEALING WITH SOME SMOKE PROBLEMS AS YOU GO INTO THE WEEKEND, EVEN INTO PORTIONS OF NEXT WEEK.

Note to leave you on, guys, we talked about a tropical system yesterday, but we now have our first named storm. It is Tropical Storm Alvin, but as of right now, doesn't look to make a landfall as a tropical storm anywhere, either Mexico or in the U.S. Gentlemen? Lonnie Quinn. Thanks, Lonnie. Children have no greater friend than Mona Khanna. What she's done for them, what she's doing for them. That's tonight's Eye on America next. Put us in a box.

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The subject of our next story is offering, on her website, no-strings-attached love. Now that we have your attention, we want to tell you about the unique program she created to get the lives of kids off to a good start. Mark Strassman has tonight's Eye on America. In Flint, Michigan, every family in this baby parade celebrated a gift from the same woman.

pediatrician Mona Hanna. How can you say no to these babies? Like how can you say no? Dr. Mona to just about everybody. The program she's created here is an American first, RxKids. You sound amazing. So what was the idea? I wanted something that literally would be able to

to prescribe away the pathogen of poverty. She's raised more than $100 million, 80% from private donors. Now every expectant mother in Flint, regardless of income, can get $1,500 during her pregnancy. Once the baby's born, it's $500 a month for up to a year.

up to $7,500, no strings attached. - This amount of money is a lifesaver, a game changer for our families. They can buy diapers. They don't have to choose between being homeless or having a roof over their heads. - How do you know that the money that you give these folks will be spent on the right things? - This is based on global evidence. We are telling families

We see you, we hear you, and we trust you. Hannah knows child poverty runs in Flint's bloodstream. There is no safe level of lead in a child, none. In 2015, she brought national attention to the city's corroding water pipes and linked them to children with lead poisoning. Now she's tackling poverty. We literally have like created a program based on love. In four areas of Michigan, any expectant mother can apply. But this is telling.

Here in Flint, the program reports 60% of enrolled families have an annual household income of less than $10,000. When Angela Century was pregnant with her daughter Jolina, she remembers filling out a five-minute questionnaire. Two weeks later, I had money in my bank account. What kind of a difference did having this money make? I didn't have to stress out, and I could focus on the baby.

Michigan State Senator John DeMoose is a conservative Republican from a red district. He's no fan of handouts, but pushed hard to get RxKids in his district. It's extremely efficient. There's no government bureaucracy whatsoever. This is actually a great program that meets people right where they need it.

Since early last year, RxKids has spread roughly $10 million to more than 2,200 families. So this is a plug-and-play program. It is already built. With dollars at the table, we are ready to go live in communities across the nation. A baby gift with a lifelong impact. Now that deserves a parade. For Eye on America, I'm Mark Strassman in Flint, Michigan.

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Finally tonight, three record breakers with one thing in common. They've repeatedly broken their own records. Kami Rita Sherpa completed his 31st climb of Mount Everest, beating his own record of 30. Rita, a Nepali guide, has climbed Everest nearly every year since 1994. Idaho's David Rush transferred a record 1.3 gallons of water by hand

from one container to another in 30 seconds. That beat the record he set last year by nearly a half gallon. Russia's other records include 198 bites out of three juggled apples in a minute. In all, he holds more than 190 records, the current concurrent record record. And Iran's Abu Faisal Saber Moqtari

stuck 96 spoons to his body beating his 2023 record of 88. the way it works he says is he transfers the energy from his body to the spoons now all he needs is some soup or some oatmeal how about that that is the cbs evening news i'm maurice dubois i'm john dickerson see you soon on evening news plus streaming on cbs news 24 7. have a good night we'll see you right back here tomorrow

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