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Hey, I'm Ryan Reynolds. Recently, I asked Mint Mobile's legal team if big wireless companies are allowed to raise prices due to inflation. They said yes. And then when I asked if raising prices technically violates those onerous two-year contracts, they said, what the f*** are you talking about, you insane Hollywood a**hole?
So to recap, we're cutting the price of Mint Unlimited from $30 a month to just $15 a month. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. $45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes. See details. It's Thursday, January 23rd, right now on CNN This Morning. They were treated like the worst criminals in history. Not backing down, President Trump defending his sweeping pardons of January 6th rioters. Fuss.
We're concentrating on the worst first. Immigration transformation, a flurry of executive orders from the West Wing. Today, new policies will be tested in court and later. Is it that important for China to be spying on young people? Brushing aside concerns, President Trump downplaying the threat of TikTok after giving the app a reprieve and this. It's a completely different beast. A fast-moving fire, a new blaze in Southern California exploding in size. Palmer conditions could help Cruz get the upper hand.
All right, it is 6 a.m. here on the East Coast, a live look at the Washington Monument on this Thursday morning. Still chilly here in D.C. Good morning, everyone. I'm Casey Hunt. It's wonderful to have you with us. President Trump giving his first Oval Office interview, defending his decision to grant clemency to more than 1,500 people convicted of or facing charges related to January 6th. They were treated like the worst criminals in history. And you know what they were there for? They were protesting the vote.
because they knew the election was rigged and they were protesting the vote. And that should be allowed to protest a vote. Most of the people were absolutely innocent. Some of the rioters may get more than just a pardon. Two sources telling CNN the Trump administration is considering inviting some of the convicts who received pardons to the White House for a meeting with the president.
And now federal judges overseeing some of the January 6th cases, making it clear they disagree with Trump's characterization of that day. In an order granting the Justice Department's request to close an alleged rioters ongoing case, Judge Tanya Chutkan, who presided over Trump's election subversion case, writing that the dismissal, quote,
"cannot whitewash the blood, feces, and terror that the mob left in its wake, and it cannot repair the jagged breach in America's sacred tradition of peacefully transitioning power." Chuckin later adding, quote, "The historical record established by those proceedings must stand, unmoved by political winds, as a testament and as a warning." End quote. The tone from those who saw their cases dismissed, their sentences commuted, or their convictions pardoned, strikingly different.
We stood up against a stolen election. We will be vindicated in the pages of history as patriots and freedom fighters. It is no longer the age where we have to hide in America. We are back, the patriots. We don't have to crawl in the corners of Facebook and Instagram being censored. We've got X, we've got Trump, we've got Musk, we've got the dream team. We're back.
We've got Trump, we've got Musk, we're back. That was Edward Jacob Lang. He faced numerous charges for his alleged actions on January 6th, including assaulting police officers with a baseball bat and a riot shield. President Trump granted him a full pardon.
The sudden release of a wave of people convicted of or charged with violent felonies, leading the Justice Department to notify officers who testified against their attackers at January 6th trials. Aquilino Ganel, a former staff sergeant with the Capitol Police, he posted these screen grabs to social media, writing, quote, each email and call log is a different rioter who assaulted me.
President Trump's mass pardons also bringing renewed anguish for law enforcement officials who were injured defending the Capitol on that day. That's DC Metropolitan Police Officer Daniel Hodges. Rioters pinned him against a door, ripping off his gas mask as they assaulted him, resulting in a concussion. I was beaten, crushed, kicked, punched, surrounded,
Someone reached underneath my visor, tried to gouge out my eye. And all these people were just pardoned by Donald Trump, who says that they were the real victims, that they were the patriots. I don't understand that.
Joining us now to discuss Michael Warren, senior editor for The Dispatch, Molly Ball, senior political correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Kendra Barkoff, former press secretary for Joe Biden when he was vice president, and Matt Gorman, former senior advisor to Tim Scott's presidential campaign. Welcome to all of you. Mike Warren, it is so hard to watch that, to watch that police officer who was trying to defend the lives of everybody inside that building that day die.
talk about what has happened to him. He's obviously not the only one. He was standing there with other members of various police forces who all converged to talk about this. Michael Fanone, another DC Metro police officer, has said he feels betrayed by his country. This is, again, a Republican president who did this, and that sort of contrast, and a president who is claiming that he is in favor of law and order.
Yeah, and look, I think there is still a residual sense that this ought to be sort of politically difficult for somebody to issue these pardons. And in fact, just last week, J.D. Vance, the incoming vice president, said, of course,
Obviously, I think was the word he used, violent criminals, people who are convicted of violent crimes will not be pardoned. Well, that's just been swept aside. And I think it's just a reminder that that pardon power that the president has is absolute. There's no debating it. And it really matters who the president is who is issuing those pardons.
By the way, this reporting that CNN has that he's considering bringing some of these defendants and convicted criminals to the White House sounds to me like somebody within the administration trying to get a bad idea out there so that it's eventually killed. I would be very surprised to see that.
those folks coming to the White House on Monday. But I don't know, you never know. - Why would they wanna drag this out, Molly? - I would not be surprised. I mean, I think what we have seen is that Donald Trump's determination to rewrite the history of what happened on January 6th is,
continuing and in some ways complete. You know, he believes that he has a mandate to do this. And it's certainly something he talked about over and over in the campaign. Now, a lot of even Republicans are quite uncomfortable with this and uncomfortable with, you know, having Stuart Rhodes walking around buildings in the Capitol yesterday. But this is, again, something that Trump feels he was elected to do. And it's and one of his top priorities.
Matt, one of the things that Donald Trump did do on the campaign trail repeatedly was play an anthem. And I just want to bring it back into the conversation because to Molly's point, this is something he promised over and over and over again. He's now making good at it on it. Let's watch that. Ladies and gentlemen, please rise for the horribly and unfairly treated January 6th hostages. Let us rise.
one nation under god so that of course from march of 2024 and he talked a little bit about this in the interview with hannity uh last night i'm sorry last night let's watch that
This was a political hoax. And you know what? Those people, and I'm not saying in every single case, but there was a lot of patriotism with those people. You know, they did a recording and, you know, they asked me if I do the voiceover. I did. It was the number one selling song, number one on Billboard, number one on everything, on everything for so long.
People get it. They wanted to see those people. American people. So Matt Gorman, clearly there are some people that wanted to see that, but it doesn't seem like the majority of Americans would want this. No, look, I don't, to Molly's point and Mike's point, elongating this sort of thing is, I don't think it's very helpful. I think it was very clear that he wanted to do this. He didn't hide the ball on this, like you saw with some Biden's pardons. He was very clear, like you knew this was going to happen within the first week at the latest.
Elongating this, I don't think it's helpful. At the same time, I don't think there is a political price to be paid by the pardons itself. We'll see if this bleeds into a multi-week story, whether that happens. But I think one of the consistent themes is both Republicans, those in the party that want to defend this, or I think on the left that was really want to push January 6th as a major electoral issue, it hasn't found salience.
We'll see if that changes. It hasn't so far. There's no evidence to see that it's going to change so far. But again, at the point, if this becomes in two weeks of the Trump presidency, we'll see. I do think this is a politically loser of an issue for Donald Trump overall. You saw in the interview last night with Hannity that
Donald Trump was talking about January 6th. Hannity tried to change the subject to talk about the economy. That's why people voted for Donald Trump to begin with, was to lower gas prices, lower prices of eggs and milk. Hannity tried to change the subject multiple times to talk about the economy, and Trump kept bringing it back around to January 6th.
So I think Trump, as long as he wants to keep, you know, talking about January 6th, it's going to completely screw up exactly why people, in theory, voted for him as president. Yeah, I will say, Molly, like, there's a ton to talk about. Donald Trump's, you know, put out an absolute avalanche of executive orders, these pardons, these policy things. Prices don't seem to be one of the things that...
I mean, we're even having a conversation about here because you can't really find it. Well, I mean, he even said on Inauguration Day that he wasn't as interested in the economy as he was in immigration. And I think that's when this becomes politically damaging is it would be one thing if this was pull off the Band-Aid and move on. But he's not moving on. He's relitigating it over and over and over again. And he's obsessed with it. And you see this with the Republican
on the hill as well, on the one hand saying, let's not live in the past, and then appointing a new committee to reinvestigate all of this stuff. So do they want to move on or don't they? And I think if people do start to get the impression that yes, he was elected to lower the price of groceries and housing, but instead he's focused on making sure that people who assaulted police are let out of jail, that's when it starts to become, I think, a political problem. And the clock is ticking.
as well. I mean, you can hear from even Trump allies. People like Steve Bannon are, are very eager to get things going on the Trump agenda on Capitol Hill. Um, and those midterm elections of 2026, we don't know how they're going to turn out. Uh, Democrats could win. Republicans could maintain control. But, uh,
But the clock is ticking on trying to get anything done the longer that he's sort of consumed by the retribution stuff. Which again, he said he was going to do it when he was elected, so it shouldn't be a surprise to us. But Donald Trump is somebody who a lot of voters sort of pour their own idea of what they want Donald Trump to be. There are a loud, large number of voters who wanted the retribution.
But a lot of voters were voting on the economy. A lot of voters were voting on sort of cultural issues that didn't really have to do with January 6th. The clock is ticking on Donald Trump's presidency, and he doesn't have another term to run for, so he's got to get stuff done. Kendra, one of the reasons it seems like Democrats may be so demoralized is that the fact that all of this happened on January 6th and Trump's still
was reelected with no longer over 50%, but a plurality, won the popular vote. How do you think for Democrats, should they be leaving this in the past from a political perspective? Or is this something in the midterm elections, are we going to see ads about how, you know, Donald Trump freed cop beaters? Look, I think we saw that there was a big single voter issue this election. People wanted lower prices across the board. And so I think...
Democrats need to focus on making sure that those things happen. And I don't think we should re-litigate the past. I don't think we should be talking about these issues because I do think when Donald Trump is talking about it, he's not talking about anything else. And so I do think, to your point, the midterms are coming up. Two years is not that far away from now. They should be talking about the economy.
All right. We have a lot more to talk about today, but I do just want to take one moment as we wrap up this conversation to think about the police officers who on that day were violently assaulted. Their lives were changed forever. They were defending other people. And this for them, they describe it as an incredible blow. So let's as we go to break, just just watch Officer Hodges one more time. I was beaten, crushed, kicked, punched, surrounded, beaten.
Someone reached underneath my visor, tried to gouge out my eye. And all these people were just pardoned by Donald Trump, who says that they were the real victims, that they were the patriots. I don't understand.
I'm CNN tech reporter Claire Duffy. This week on the podcast, Terms of Service. On January 7th, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that Meta will discontinue its third-party fact-checking program in the United States. Fighting disinformation is more crucial than ever. Fact-checking is a huge piece of that puzzle. What do third-party fact-checkers actually do? Follow CNN's Terms of Service wherever you get your podcasts.
No court in this country has never interpreted the birthright citizenship clause to mean what the president seeks it to mean and what he's trying to do.
That was Attorney General Rob Bonta of California, one of the two dozen states and cities who are suing the administration over President Donald Trump's move to end birthright citizenship in the U.S. This morning, a federal judge in Seattle will hear arguments challenging the order. It is one of multiple lawsuits attempting to stop President Trump from enacting one of his signature immigration plans. It's a constitutional question that could end up before the U.S. Supreme Court.
It has, of course, been less than a week since President Trump returned to the Oval Office. He's already issued sweeping immigration plans. He was asked about that in his first Oval Office interview with Fox News yesterday. Who would ask for open borders with people pouring in, some of whom I won't get into it, but you can look at them.
And you can say, could be trouble. Could be trouble. There are people coming in. There are people with gang tattoos on. There are people coming in with tattoos all over their face. Their entire face is covered with tattoos. That identifies a gang. Typically, you know he's not going to be the head of the local bank.
Kendra Barkoff, I will say this is something people in the country, especially when they talk about criminals, people favor deporting them, right? By overwhelming majority as an AP poll showed 83% support deporting undocumented immigrants with a violent criminal conviction. 69% support deporting legal status immigrants with a violent criminal conviction.
Do you see a world where some of what the president is doing here oversteps in a way that is going to be politically problematic for him? Or is it Democrats who are in a tough spot here needing to perhaps readjust how they've talked about this issue? Look, I think it's really interesting that in 2024, February of 2024, Trump tanked the bipartisan immigration bill.
because he wanted it as a talking point. He sees the political nature of what this is. I think we can all up here agree that our immigration system is broken, but doing it in a piecemeal approach and doing it in the way that they're trying to do it with EOs here and with bills there, I just don't think it's going to accomplish the greater good of what
The larger problem is there are real problems with our immigration system and with some of these folks committing crimes. But the piecemeal approach I just don't think is going to be the way to do it. It's certainly going to get covered, though, Matt, in a way that, you know,
People are gonna perceive that Donald Trump is tackling this problem. - Yeah, he is. I mean, look, the Overton window in this has shifted dramatically in just the last two years, right? Like this isn't 2013 anymore where you're gonna have a gang of eight come together and do this thing that's over the course of 10 years and there's legal status. No, I mean, I think the Biden year is really personified with the problem of the board that drastic action needed to be taken and you're doing it. I think Democrats make a mistake when they try and portray
kind of these actions as if it's SEAL Team 6 kicking in the door to St. Patrick's Cathedral and handcuffing 80-year-old grandmothers. It sets the expectation bar so high and when you have the first kind of ice raids coming out of Boston, that clearly these are not 80-year-old grandmothers in wheelchairs here. It really, I think it sets expectations way off from reality. But I do think that this is a Donald Trump PR stunt in the way that he did these EOs. I don't think that he is doing these for the purposes that is going to really make a difference. Well, I think
Well, I think the question is, how far are they going to go? Right. I mean, they did 300 on the first day and at that rate, it will only take 98 years to get to all 11 million. I did that. Right. So and that's basically the pace that the Biden administration was on. So is this sort of a big show and they're focusing on the least controversial deportees, the violent criminals, or
Or are they going to, to Matt's point, actually try to get the entire undocumented population, which is likely to be much less popular? Are they going to try to pursue this birthright citizenship thing and start kicking newborn babies out of the country who previously would have had legal status? That's probably going to be a lot less popular. So I think with a lot of the promises Donald Trump has made, the question is, how far is he going to go? And will the public stay on his side if he goes
Yeah, I'm sort of, you know,
I look at all of these different immigration pieces separately, and I do agree. A lot of the EOs, the 14th Amendment stuff, it's press releases, glorified press release. He can't just do that. And of course, we're seeing the legal challenges which we should have expected. I do think the raids, the increased number of officials who were able to process these deportations, it's going to be popular. It's what he was elected to do.
I think Donald Trump has a good ear and a good sense for when things might go too far. Tom Homan has already essentially said he's not really interested in going into churches and schools. I think if that is at the point where the Donald Trump immigration policy is, Donald Trump is going to be able, I think, to recognize that might be a little bit too far and pull back. And I feel like it's going to be less than promised, but exactly what Americans actually kind of want in immigration enforcement.
All right. Coming up next here on CNN This Morning, fire and ice, the weather extremes, two new fires burning in California, the East Coast waiting for warmer temperatures, plus Elon Musk putting a damper on President Trump's big AI plan.
All right, welcome back. We've got extreme weather conditions from coast to coast. In the southeast, all that melting ice and snow could refreeze, leading to dangerous road conditions. It is still very cold in the south. And in California, with two new fires prompting evacuations, the latest fire started just hours after crews started getting the Hughes fire at least a little bit contained. Let's get to our meteorologist, Allison Chinchar, with more on this. Allison, good morning.
And good morning. Yes, the fire that you can see behind me from this highway off in the distance here. This is the one that is just northwest of downtown Los Angeles near Sherman Oaks, CA. Again, as you mentioned, we have several fires that we are keeping an eye on right now. Five in total and they range various portions of Southern California, some a little bit with higher containment than others.
The red flag warning is in effect not just for today, but this continues into early Friday morning. Some of these gusts up around 55 to 65 mph on the northern side and a little bit farther south could guest as high as 70 mph. Now again, the concern here is just how dry it has been in this area.
260 consecutive days with less than a tenth of an inch of rain. It's the longest stretch they've had in Los Angeles on record. Now there is a bit of good news and that is there is finally a chance of some rain in the forecast that would begin this weekend and continue through the early portion of next week. The concern here is all of those areas that have been on fire. The burn scar areas. Those often could lead to mudslide potential when you get very heavy rain, so something to keep an eye on elsewhere across the US.
the big story here is just the bitter cold right now, well below freezing even far south Atlanta, Charleston, Jacksonville, Florida, New Orleans, all looking at those current temperatures below the freezing mark, and it's expected to continue to stay cold, especially in the mornings here over the next several days. So even this morning, you've still got all of these areas dealing with those extreme cold advisories, but there is light at the end of the tunnel. Casey, a lot of these places will warm up by the weekend.
Okay, we could use a little bit of that here in Washington. Alison Chinchar, thanks very much for that. All right, still ahead here on CNN this morning, the Trump administration asking federal workers to snitch on their coworkers in a rollback of diversity, equity, and inclusion programs. We are joined by Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin to discuss the rapid changes being rolled out by the new president. Plus, billionaire beef, Elon Musk openly trashing one of President Trump's tech policies. I'm Dr. Sanjay Gupta, host of the Chasing Life podcast.
Pain is there as a signal to sort of galvanize you into action. Dr. James Dankert, co-author of the book Out of My Skull, The Psychology of Boredom. Dankert is saying that boredom is essentially a motivational state. It's not an emotion. We're going to embrace boredom and we're going to learn how we can benefit from it. Listen to Chasing Life, streaming now, wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, welcome back. A new escalation in President Trump's efforts to roll back diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in the federal government. Our country is going to be based on merit again.
After ordering an end to all DEI initiatives across federal agencies, the administration is now warning workers they have 10 days to report colleagues who are trying to conceal DEI programs. If workers don't comply, they will face "adverse consequences," according to an email sent to multiple agencies and reviewed by CNN. The president's allies say the initiatives are part of the administration's plans to cut government bureaucracy.
There are already rules on the books. You cannot discriminate against a minority or someone that's too old. These laws are written in. You cannot discriminate. So we believe the DEI is just an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy. All right, joining us now is Mayor Randall Woodfin of Birmingham, Alabama. His new book, Son of Birmingham, a memoir, is out now. Mr. Mayor, thanks for joining us. Casey, good morning. Thanks for allowing me to have some time with you.
So let's start with what the president has done here. What impact will this stripping of DEI offices from the federal government ultimately have? Listen, the unfortunate part of this conversation of stripping DEI, Americans are witnessing the Alabamification of federal government. We've seen in Alabama legislators create laws to get rid of DEI and the governor signing to law that
removing DEI from colleges and universities and other aspects throughout the state. And so we've seen this dance and the unfortunate part is other Americans have to witness this at the national level. That being the case, we all know those who benefit the most from DEI are veterans as well as white women. And so DEI has always gone well beyond African Americans and other minorities.
When you say you don't want to have programs that support veterans, when you say you don't want to have programs that support women, etc., what are you really saying? What message and who are you trying to communicate with? And so it's beyond frustrating and disappointing. It just goes to show you that 47 told us what he would do, and he's doing it. Sir, do you think there are any areas where DEI programs have gone too far?
I do not believe that's the case. Look, we've made the words diversity. We've made the words equity. We, as in others, have made those words, inclusion, bad words.
Inclusion is not a bad thing. There's no such thing as going too far as it relates to being inclusive. There's no such thing as going too far as it relates to equity. This is America. Equity is the right thing to do. There's no such thing as diversity being bad. America is a very diverse place. I think diversity, equity, and inclusion has been weaponized for some to use to say it's taken away from others, but what it's really doing is making sure
We're intentional, whether it's at the federal level, state level, colleges and universities level, corporate America level, that there's parity. And we've been talking about this for quite some time. And so, no, there's no such thing as going too far when we talk about equity and inclusion.
-Sir, another topic at the forefront of President Trump's initial week here in office is immigration. And they have promised to step up deportations. And there has been some pushback from local officials, especially in blue states and cities, about cooperating with ICE.
for mass deportations. Will the city of Birmingham cooperate with ICE officials as they step up raids, if they step up raids in the city, especially in schools and in churches? Casey, again, I can tell you the unfortunate part about this, and you may hear me keep repeating myself, that the United States of America is witnessing the Alabamification of the federal government. Again, we've been here before in the state of Alabama.
with the House bill literally over a decade ago, 2010, and that brought in sweeping legislations to target our Hispanic community throughout the state of Alabama. And what we witnessed across the state is that many community members, partners, et cetera, stood tall with those who were here legally. I think the conversation around illegal immigrants
There can be an actual healthy debate. I think all Americans agree that those that are here illegal and those who are here illegal and have committed crime should be deported. That's not up for debate. I think what is up for debate is when you consider the impact of those who are here, who were born here. And you have an executive order that says that can no longer happen as it relates to being American citizens.
What are we saying for our school systems? What are we saying for our employers, etc.? And so the city of Birmingham will continue to work with organizations like the Hispanic Interest Coalition of Alabama to make sure that the city of Birmingham is on the right side of supporting families, supporting families who need assistance, etc.
Still, you declined to sign a measure that would have made Birmingham a sanctuary city by law. So again, will Birmingham cooperate with federal authorities who are doing deportations in your city? So Birmingham has always been a welcoming city, Casey. And I think this conversation about what will the city of Birmingham do or not do is a very interesting question because we have a party that holds themselves out as law and order.
And then we've just seen what they've done with these massive pardons for those who committed treasonous acts, not just against the Capitol. What are you saying to your police forces, your local cops, if ICE comes to town? What should they do? I think our police force is literally focused on the public safety of our citizens. We're focused on gun violence.
We're focused on the things that we deem necessary to keep citizens safe. We also have a priority to hire more officers. And so we're already short officers, if that makes any sense. So our key priority is making sure that we are actually policing our streets. Our priority is making sure that we can tackle gun violence. And when you think about it, there's this conversation on one hand about ICE and immigration, and then we're not paying attention to the fact that a city like Birmingham facing gun violence at a
at a fortunate, on high rate. They've just gotten rid of the Office of Gun Violence Prevention at the White House. And so, you know, we have our priorities in the city of Birmingham. Our priorities are to keep people safe. Our priorities are to focus on gun violence and decrease gun violence. Our priority is to focus on innovative and creative ways to improve quality of life for the citizens of Birmingham.
All these flurries of executive orders, we have not seen the price of eggs go down yet. And so what's the real focus? And the focus should be on the American people, making sure people are safe, making sure we improve quality of life. We haven't seen that in the last 48 hours. All right. Mayor Randall Woodfin, thanks very much for spending some time with us this morning. You can pick up a copy of his new book, Son of Birmingham, out now.
Coming up next here on CNN This Morning, downplaying the national security risk. President Donald Trump continues to embrace TikTok, now asking, quote, "Is it that important for China to be spying on young people?" Plus, at odds, Elon Musk becoming a vocal critic of the president's new deal on AI investment, questioning whether it's valid. The American people should take President Trump and those CEOs' words for it. These investments are coming to our great country.
President Donald Trump's newly announced AI infrastructure project, overshadowed really by a billionaire brawl, after announcing that the White House will work with the CEOs of OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle to pour up to $500 billion into AI investments, Trump's own ally and the head of Doge, Elon Musk, cast doubt on the idea. He posted, quote, they don't actually have the money.
Sam Altman of OpenAI replied directly. He says this, quote, I realize what is great for the country isn't always what's optimal for your companies, but in your new role, I hope you'll mostly put America, the flag, first. Musk's public contradiction around Trump's initiatives reportedly causing a stir among the president's allies. That's reporting from Politico. The conservative radio host Eric Erickson made this comparison.
Think someone who actually is a friend of Elon Musk's needs to do an intervention because I think he's becoming Icarus. Icarus flew so high and so close to the sun, the wax began to melt, the feathers begin to drop off, and he plummeted to the earth. Donald Trump doesn't like people to be more exposed than him, and he's headed that way. He needs to be careful if he wants to have a real impact. He needs to stay behind the scenes and not in the spotlight.
All right, our panel's back. Mike Warren, look, everyone in Washington seems to be taking bets on how long this, you know, bromance is going to last. Now, the difference between anyone else who might try to outshine Donald Trump in whatever way is the money, right? Elon Musk is the richest person in the world and funded tons of his campaign. And, you know, alienating him has downsides for Trump. That said, this is a little embarrassing for Trump.
Yeah, it's a little embarrassing, but so what? Like every day there's going to be an embarrassing thing for Donald Trump. He keeps moving. And I think actually that is a big reason why he and Elon Musk are going to be pretty tight for a while. There's actually a lot of people going after Elon Musk. Trump allies, people, I mean, everybody from Steve Bannon, I mean, you heard Eric Erickson talking about these dangers. That probably endears Musk to Trump or Trump to Musk, however that works.
in a way where they see themselves as kindred spirits. Everybody's going after Musk, everybody's coming after Trump. I think it's gonna last for a while. The question for me is how much is Musk gonna be interested in this? And I'm very interested in how much in terms of transparency, how much in terms of access to top secret information Musk is able to get from this position. If he strikes out, you might see him saying, "This was very interesting,
I'm moving on from the government. But he needs federal government money to go to Mars, which is something that he has devoted his entire life to. Molly Ball, Mike mentioned Steve Bannon. So this was the latest set of attacks from Steve Bannon. He says, quote, I've never seen action like this in my life.
Trump's one-time chief strategist said he called on the White House chief of staff, Suzy Wiles, to sit him, Elon, down and sort it out immediately. There is something fundamentally wrong here about the structure and his understanding of the structure. This is not Silicon Valley. This is not Tech Bros. Or is it? Well, we'll see. I mean, I think it depends if, for now, Elon's just popping off, right? He's just saying things on social media. He's sort of a critic.
But he's going to have an office in the White House. He has an office in the White House. So what is he going to actually try to do? Right. And I think the infighting is going to come when he starts trying to actually push whatever initiatives he's going to actually push for, whether they're things that advantage his companies or whether they're just things that he believes in ideologically. But other parts of the MAGA movement do not, as we saw with the H-1B debate that
played out before the inauguration. So once Elon has things he's actually trying to do, and there are others in Trump's orbit who disagree with those things, that's when the real clash is going to come. For now, it's just a Twitter fight. I mean, yeah, to be fair, Bannon was the one who said he was going to try and get Elon kind of knocked out before the inauguration. Didn't really go well. And look, the context of this is it's far deeper than
purely the Trump stuff, right? So Elon was on the board of OpenAI. They had some strong disagreements about the future of all of this. And then Elon founded XAI, which is obviously a competitor to OpenAI and where we get kind of like a lot of the AI stuff around X and things like that. So this is far beyond politics, I will say. And the tech bro...
blood feud goes kind of deep in a lot of ways. - It's 'cause these guys have known and worked with each other for like decades now, right? - A long time. There is a lot of history there. And so that's why I also, it's not something that is suddenly a critique of the policy itself or SkyGate or whatever that is. It is something that is personal and goes back decades. - I was gonna say, it's a measuring, it's a competition.
What kind of measuring? What are we measuring the size of exactly? To our great president, Barack Obama, I think did this gesture. He did. Just what Americans voted for, by the way. Yeah. Silicon Valley fight. Not that. Silicon Valley fight, you know, here in D.C., yeah. Okay. With that, it is 51 minutes past the hour. Here's your morning roundup. I'm going to release them immediately upon getting, we're going to see the information. We're looking at it right now.
President Donald Trump repeating his vow to immediately release the FBI files on John F. Kennedy's assassination. He is also planning to declassify RFK and Martin Luther King Jr. assassination files.
Seven San Antonio police officers were shot last night while responding to a call about a suicide in progress. The suspect was found dead after a long standoff. None of the officers' injuries are believed to be life-threatening. According to authorities, the shooter, who's not been identified, was arrested last weekend on assault and DWI charges and was out on bond.
A new fire has erupted in the Sherman Oaks neighborhood of Los Angeles overnight with an evacuation warning issued for people living there. Thousands had already been told to leave north of LA because of the Hughes fire, which developed Wednesday. So far, crews have that fire about 14% contained.
Oscar nominations will be announced this morning after they were delayed earlier this month because of those wildfires in LA. Fans hoping wicked will get some nods. Conclave also expected to be in the running today along with a complete unknown, the Bob Dylan story. The show goes on on March 2nd. All right, let's turn now to the ongoing effort to save TikTok.
TikTok, I'm on a private jet right now about to put in my official offer for this platform. I might become your guys' new CEO. I wish I could say more about the offer I'm putting in, but I can't for now. Just know it's going to be crazy.
That's YouTube star Mr. Beast, the latest big name offering to buy TikTok from its Chinese parent company ByteDance. A ByteDance board member said yesterday the company is in fact in active discussions about a deal that would allow the popular app to continue operating in the U.S., adding that an agreement could be reached as soon as the end of the week. In his first Oval Office interview, President Trump defended his decision to delay the ban, dismissing security concerns.
Those that say they know say it's a spying app for the communist Chinese. But you can say that about everything made in China. Look, we have our telephones made in China for the most part. We have so many things made in China. So why don't they mention that? You know, the interesting thing with TikTok, though, is you're dealing with a lot of young people. So they love it. Is it that important for China to be spying on young people, on young kids watching crazy videos?
So, Matt Gorman, this is a switch for President Trump, who, of course, in 2020, signed an executive order to try to ban TikTok because he was listening to the national security community that said that this is a problem, this is a national security threat to the United States. Now he's saying it's not. What's true? I mean, you're seeing very suddenly both parties switching on this very quickly as Biden tried to undo it before he left office. The fact is,
I don't believe that ByteDance will sell this because it's not a rational market actor. It's owned by the CCP. So Mr. Beast can do all the private jets he wants. He can make all the offers he wants. They're not going to sell because to them, the data spying on Americans is far more important than doing a deal with some random massive YouTube star. And so the fact is, I don't see how they get out of this the way it is because you're not dealing with a market actor that wants money.
By the way, Trump says that he doesn't understand why people should be concerned, but Republicans in Congress, and not just Republicans, Democrats in Congress. Like 80% of Congress. Exactly. Thinks that it's a problem. I do think that this is an issue that we could see the first real big divide between the Republican Congress and Donald Trump on this. I think they're going to do it in their own way to be a little gingerly about it. They don't want to upset this new president too much, but
Republicans in Congress feel very strongly about this, and I think they're going to push back and try to find a way to get him to reverse this or to stop the executive order. And there's a good political reason for him to do that, as we said. Bipartisan, 80% of Congress voted for it. Well, and Molly Ball, the bottom line here is that, I mean, this is a law, right? I mean, like, can Trump just flout a law that says if this is not sold in 90 days, it cannot operate here?
I think that's a big question. Not only is it a law that passed on a bipartisan, overwhelming basis, but it was upheld by the Supreme Court unanimously. And there is not a clause in the law that says the president could just cancel it.
So, and I think to Matt's point, there has not been a lot of evidence to date that they actually want to sell the app and relinquish control for the Chinese government. So, you know, this is going to be a real problem if he wants to continue down this road, both for how he is able to get his way against the other two branches of government,
and also for just the underlying issue, which let's not forget, you know, although TikTok is popular, the TikTok ban is also popular. A majority of Americans supported it, at least when it happened. Now, maybe that's changed now that Trump has switched and a lot of these members are afraid of their constituents. I mean, some crazy teenager actually tried to
burned down a congressional office over the TikTok ban. A Republican congressional office, I think, in Wisconsin. So there is a level of fear that their constituents are so crazy because TikTok makes people crazy. I was not quite, you know, intellectually, I understood, I saw people are addicted to it. Then this ban went into effect. And even, I mean, I'm a little bit older. I'm like outside of the TikTok demo, but I have some friends my age. I was stunned.
by the sheer panic and sadness that people were displaying over this when it disappeared for a day. - Just go on Instagram. That's like the TikTok for elder millennials. - Well, this is where I was seeing this content, to be clear. - That's true. - It's not actually on TikTok. I was consuming it on Instagram. - I was gonna say, I think this talks to the larger point about social media more broadly speaking and the addictive nature of it, and I think that's
part of the reason why you are seeing all of these big CEOs coming to DC to suck up to Donald Trump to begin with. You saw Mark Zuckerberg and his gold chains and his, I don't even know what's going on with him, coming to DC and sitting in the front row of his inauguration. You're seeing that
This is the power of these social media platforms, and it's dangerous. It's dangerous for children. It's dangerous for the addiction of it. People have committed suicide over it. It's a bigger problem than... It is a problem on the spying issue, but it's a big problem even in... Well, and the influence, too. I mean, for Trump to say, I don't know, who cares about the spying? I mean, if they're able to influence...
our children directly that is a big it's a big deal all right i will leave you with this with the cold snap forcing much of the country indoors you might be feeling what is called the winter blues not totally dissimilar to jack nicholson's character in the stanley kubrick classic the shining
Oh dear, don't fret. You're not alone. It turns out even fish get lonely during these dark months of winter. At least one fish in particular did. A sunfish in a Japanese aquarium suddenly seemed to become unwell when the aquarium closed in December 2024 for renovations. There were no more visitors.
So what did the staff do? They put up cardboard cutouts of people donned in aquarium uniforms. And according to the aquarium, quote, on the next day, the fish was in good health again. So if you are feeling these effects of these cold winter months indoors, just remember there's nothing like a tank buddy. If there's anything you need, just ask your Auntie Deb. That's me. Just keep swimming, as they say. Thanks to our panel. Thanks to all of you for joining us. I'm Casey Hunt. Don't go anywhere. CNN News Central starts right now.
CNN Original Series presents the story of an athlete who changed the game. Go inside the conflicts and complications behind the man who became the Black Mamba. Kobe, The Making of a Legend, premieres January 25th at 9 on CNN.