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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees

Trump Pauses Most Tariffs for 90-days, but Hits China Harder; Interview with Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY); Stocks Soar After Trump Announces 90-day Pause on Most Tariffs; Trump Directs DOJ to Investigate Critics; 90-day Pause Now for Most Trump Tariffs, but China Now Facing Stiffer 125 Percent Tariff; Sources Say Treasury Secretary's Growing Concern Over Bond Market Turmoil Helped Drive 90- day Tariff Pause. Aired 8-9p ET

Aired April 09, 2025 - 20:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

WILL RIPLEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: ...extremely sensitive, and we can tell because we're watching the China feed. Even though you talked about the trade wars for like half of your show and they didn't censor that, they're censoring this report now because people are asking here in Taipei and around the world, why is Xi cracking down?

Is he worried that his military might crumble if there was a conflict over Taiwan, just like Russians did in Ukraine? You know, corruption we know, runs deep. Commanders selling promotions, taking bribes, even running side hustles, Erin. The weapon systems may be compromised much, disloyalty to the party actually matter more than actual skill, these are the series questions China doesn't want to be asked.

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: Incredible, and there we are in bars in tone as you said, everything else they let go. Thank you very much, Will.

Thanks to all of you. It's time now for AC360.

[20:00:47]

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "ANDERSON COOPER: 360": Good evening from Washington. I'm here tonight for a special CNN Town Hall with Senator Bernie Sanders. The senator, as you may know, has been touring the country along with Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on what they call their fighting oligarchy tour, speaking to large crowds in opposition to President Trump. Elon Musk's DOGE and trying to mobilize Americans.

Tonight, well talk to him about tariffs, Trump and the future of the Democratic Party and this country. Our live audience of Democrats, Independents and Republicans will also ask questions to the senator. That's coming up at the top of the next hour. I'll see you at 9:00 P.M. Eastern for the rest of this hour. I want to send it back to New York and CNN's John Berman -- John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN HOST: All right, thanks so much, Anderson, see you at nine. So, the President has always likened his tariffs to a medical procedure. Tonight there's a better sense of what kind? The kind where you pull the plug on a critical care patient, then put the plug back in with just seconds to spare, while also claiming to be the world's greatest doctor.

The only difference is when the President did it, when he pulled the plug or kicked it out of the wall, the patient meaning the economy, the global trading system, Wall Street, and trillions of dollars in college funds and 401(k)s. It was all in pretty good health, not the ICU. Well, today, after a week of utter carnage and the prospect of even more to come, he put the plug back in.

That's the sound of investors breathing a bit easier after the President put a 90-day hold with one very big exception on much of his global tariff program that sent markets soaring. The Dow Industrials finished today up more than 7.8 percent, the S&P more than 9 percent, the NASDAQ up 12 percent. The rally began moments after his social media post, which read in part, "I've authorized a 90-day pause in a substantially lowered reciprocal tariff during this period of 10 percent, also effective immediately."

The one exception a big one, as we said, China. He bumped up the tariff on Chinese goods to 125 percent. This came just after one in the afternoon just a few hours earlier. He was telling people, "Be cool. Everything is going to go work out well." And last night he was boasting profanely about how well his tariffs were working.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I'm telling you, these countries are calling us up, kissing my ass, they are. They are dying to make a deal, please, please make a deal. I'll do anything. I'll do anything, sir.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: The administration, as you know, has claimed that as many as 70 nations are looking to start trade negotiations. And while we do know about several, most notably Israel and Vietnam, we have yet to see any deals. He retreated before getting anything. In a way, until now, he seems only to have been negotiating with himself. And in that negotiation, he blinked. And we know that because he said so.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I was watching the bond market. The bond market is very tricky. I was watching it. But if you look at it now, it's beautiful. The bond market right now is beautiful. But, yes, I saw last night where people were getting a little queasy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: He also admitted that he watched JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon this morning, who warned that these tariffs and the resulting trade war would likely cause a recession.

They were already causing a multi-trillion dollar market dive, which today's rally only partially undid. They were already bruising the value of U.S. Treasury notes, once considered the world's safest investment. The tariffs and they're on again, off again rollout were already causing allies to rethink their relationship with this country or, as Canada did, impose counter tariffs of its own.

Yet for all that damage and potential damage in dollars and standing in the world, the administration until today's partial 180 was saying it would not budge.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HOWARD LUTNICK, U.S. SECRETARY OF COMMERCE: I don't think there's any chance they're going to -- that President Trump's going to back off his tariffs.

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: He's not considering an extension or a delay.

TRUMP: I really think we're helped a lot by the tariff situation that's going on, which is a good situation.

LEAVITT: The President is firm in his approach.

REPORTER: Would you be open to a pause in tariffs to allow for negotiations?

TRUMP: Well, we're not looking at that.

LEAVITT: He expects that these tariffs are going to go into effect.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So, that was the word until it wasn't. And then once it wasn't the President and his supporters began spinning the back down as a bold stroke, including in this moment caught on a hot mic between Republican Senator John Barrasso and the President.

[20:05:10]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN BARRASSO (R-WY): You got the markets in your brilliance.

TRUMP: Yes, that's up almost seven points, 2,500 points. Nobody's ever heard of it. It's going to be a record.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Again, record or not, markets are still down about $10 trillion since this all began. The U.S. is still in an escalating trade war with China. Major banks are still saying a recession is likelier this year as a result of all this. Yet today, after the President took steps to undo some of the damage that he himself did, both he and the people around him were saying this was all part of some plan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SCOTT BESSENT, U.S. TREASURY SECRETARY: This was his strategy all along

LEAVITT: Many of you in the media clearly missed the art of the deal.

BESSENT: This was driven by the President's strategy.

PETER NAVARRO, SENIOR COUNSEL FOR TRADE AND MANUFACTURING: This is one of the greatest days in American economic history.

BESSENT: President Trump created maximum negotiating leverage for himself.

NAVARRO: I think we're going to call it the art of the reciprocal trade deal.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Or a retreat in the face of his own demands.

As for the President, he said, and these are his words, no other President would have done what I did. No other president, which can be read in any number of ways. And another thing no other president has done but this President did today, in the middle of all the turmoil. He signed an executive order reversing a federal regulation on low flow showerheads, quoting him again now, "You have to stand under a shower for 15 minutes until it gets wet. It comes out drip, drip, drip, it's ridiculous."

A lot to discuss now with New York Democratic Congressman Dan Goldman, who sits on the House Judiciary and House Homeland Security Committee.

Dan Goldman, thank you so much for being with us, congressman. So, the markets way up today. What do you make of all this?

REP. DAN GOLDMAN (D-NY): Well, it's just more chaos, dysfunction, incompetence. If this is the art of a deal, then I wish we could have known seven days ago that all we needed to do was get a few countries to call President Trump, and we wouldn't have had to deal with this entire mess. But the reality is, it's not just the incompetent strategy or lack of strategy. It's not just the failure to properly calculate the reciprocal tariffs, even as he envisions them. It is the fact that no one has any confidence that he has any control or knowledge about what he's doing.

And so, the market may go up and down and today its back up. Who knows what will happen tomorrow? But every business in America right now is retrenching. They're stopping their spending. They're stopping their hiring because there is a total chaos agent in the White House pulling the strings of our economy.

He sent our economy spiraling down. The stock market spiraling down. And now he's prepared to pull back, as you say, John, just based on pretty much nothing. He got nothing out of this deal. So, I'm still very concerned about these tariffs and the trade war with China. Europe has also returned with their own reciprocal tariffs, which have not been addressed. This is a massive, massive problem and today was a Band-Aid.

BERMAN: You say there's no strategy, but the Treasury Secretary swears this was all part of a grand plan. You don't buy that?

GOLDMAN: Obviously not, because if in any deal. Right. If you're trying to the art of the deal, we keep hearing. Okay, great, what are you trying to get out of that? Well, you would want to get some concessions. Right?

You'd want to get something that you negotiated for. All they got were phone calls from foreign countries. That's pretty easy. You could have just called them yourselves and said, hey, we might inflict tariffs on you unless you negotiate with us. They don't even have any concessions. It is a complete 180-degree turn. It is a total cave because Donald Trump recognized that whatever his rationale for the tariffs were, was not being bought by the American people and by the global economy.

BERMAN: How much damage was undone by his action today, and how much or what do you think can't be undone?

GOLDMAN: Well, I think very little was ultimately undone. We still have a 10 percent universal tariff, regardless of whether that country actually has any trade with us or not. China now is in a tremendous escalating trade war, up to 125 percent tariffs. Of course, we trade with China more than just about anybody. And no other foreign country has any confidence in dealing with Donald Trump.

So, our own business community is scared to death about what's coming next. And they're going to have to protect their bottom line. The international community wants to avoid doing business with the United States because it's so chaotic and dysfunctional and unpredictable.

So, our economy is still in a complete tailspin right now. And this was a momentary reprieve. And thankfully for everyone's 401(k)s and 529s, as you said, that the market has recovered some of the historic losses over the past few days. But we're at just the beginning of this. We're not at the end.

[20:10:26]

BERMAN: We're just getting some breaking news and I'm actually just seeing this for the first time. And you may not know it because you're out talking to me, but I'm hearing that House Speaker Mike Johnson just pulled tonight's expected vote on the Republican budget blueprint. There have been a number of Republican holdouts on this, despite the President's support. What's your take on this? And I wonder if you do think the overall economic environment for the tariffs has played in on this at all?

GOLDMAN: Well, we've been just sitting on the floor right now waiting for this current vote to finish so that they can bring up the budget vote. And there was always the possibility that they would pull it because right now they don't have the votes. My understanding is that a number of the holdouts on the Republican side were in a side room off the House floor talking to President Trump, who was trying to twist their arms in order to get them to buy into the budget.

What I find quite remarkable is that the holdouts on the Republican side appear to be the more extreme right members of the House Freedom Caucus who are unsatisfied with the guarantees of spending cuts that exist on the Senate side of this bill. None of the moderate Republicans who are effectively going to vote to cut Medicaid if they vote yet again for this budget resolution, seem to have a problem with it.

The math does not work out, John. There's no way to meet the requirements of this budget proposal without dramatically cutting Medicaid benefits that 70 million Americans rely on, 40 percent of our children. And so, I'm not surprised that some of the Republicans have held out and will push this off. I'm only surprised at which ones it is. It's not the moderates who profess to care so much about Medicaid, Social Security and Medicare and are willing to throw them under the bus with this bill.

BERMAN: Congressman Dan Goldman, we appreciate your time tonight. Very busy behind you. We'll let you get back to work.

GOLDMAN: Thank You.

BERMAN: Perspective now on the tariff situation from Richard Quest, CNN business editor at large and anchor of "Quest Means Business." Also, Jennifer Welch with "Bloomberg Economics." She previously served as director for China and Taiwan on the U.S. National Security council during the Biden and first Trump administrations. And Dasha Burns, White House Bureau Chief for POLITICO.

Richard, you called the President's tariffs economic vandalism. Okay. So was this clean-up of that vandalism and how much was cleaned up?

RICHARD QUEST, CNN BUSINESS EDITOR-AT-LARGE AND ANCHOR OF "QUEST MEANS BUSINESS": No, this was repairing a few of the windows, but didn't do much more than that. Certainly hasn't repainted or put the House back in order in any shape or form. As the Congressman said, you've still got the auto tariffs 25 percent. You've still got to 125 percent for China. You've got a general tariff of 10 percent globally, which is three times the previous 2.5 average tariff. And you've got steel and aluminum and you've got farmer and others still to come.

So, there is still a huge weight of tariffs bearing down on the global economy. And particularly if you look at the uncertainty of 90 days of not knowing. Look, is it good news? Of course, it's good news that the sword of Damocles has been, you know, raised up again. But it's still swinging.

BERMAN: Dasha, first of all, love your reporting. Glad to see you at POLITICO. You've done terrific work, and just yesterday you were reporting how ebullient everyone was in the White House. They were all thinking and saying out loud, this is going so well. So, how does that jive with what they're now saying? Which this was the strategy all along, to retreat like this.

DASHA BURNS, POLITICO, WHITE HOUSE BUREAU CHIEF: So, today we heard Trump say that this is instinct, that the way he makes decisions is gut instinct, and that the idea is to remain flexible. Just a couple of hours before that, we heard Secretary Scott Bessent say this was the plan all along and like you mentioned, John, we had been reporting that they are thrilled to see how things are going.

Well, the difference between the stock market reaction, which they were all expecting, and the bond market reaction, which wasn't really part of the calculus. That is what tipped the scales, along with what I'm hearing from my sources, is the economic advisers really presenting a united front to Trump, saying, look, the bond market is a major concern.

And number two, hey, look, they came to him with flattery. They said, Mr. President, this has been successful. Look at all of these countries that are calling you. And look at what China is doing, China is the popular position. Focus on that. Focus on beating them down and give us time to negotiate with all these people that have come to the table now.

So, it was a sort of twofold push to get Trump to this place and this is something we have to remember with, with President Trump, you just don't know until, you know.

[20:15:17]

BERMAN: And once everything is done, he'll claim victory no matter what.

Jennifer, what does China see here? Do they now feel isolated as the rest of the world has had their tariffs lifted? Or do they feel maybe emboldened because they see the White House backing down to an extent, at least on part of this?

JENNIFER WELCH, FORMER NSC DIRECTOR FOR CHINA AND TAIWAN: Well, I'm sure President Xi Jinping is waking up in Beijing right now seeing the news about a U.S. tariff hike and not thinking, first of all, I'm going to call Donald Trump.

I think what he's thinking is, it's time to battle down the hatches and dig our heels in and I think were likely to see some sort of response. China has a lot of options at its disposal, not just tariffs, but the U.S. depends on China for critical inputs, whether they be critical minerals, active pharmaceutical ingredients, battery and battery components. And I think we could see Beijing taking some moves in this direction as they feel this merits a response.

BERMAN: Richard, what happens tomorrow? And I'm not asking you to predict which way the market goes. What I'm asking is what are investors now looking for? What do they want to hold on to? What signs do they want to see?

QUEST: They want to know where this is going. They want an element of certainty that is simply not there. We have 90 days where different countries are coming in and out, in and out to negotiate their own bilateral deficit trade tariff down. But you've still got these very high level of tariffs in many cases, you've still got uncertainty and you have the knowledge that -- that the President could just turn around and say, oh no, it's back on again. Oh no, I'm doing this, that the recession that people are talking about, the Goldman, the Dimon, the Chase are all talking about that is still on the cards.

Not because this has gone away, it's still on the cards because the fundamentals of the situation haven't changed. The level of uncertainty means no business can actually make -- look at Apple, how on earth is Apple supposed to make any form of future directions, strategic growth when they don't know what is going to happen next?

BERMAN: Dasha, does the White House really think there will be negotiations with these other countries within this next 90 days? And I do wonder what these other countries now think. I mean, Canada to an extent, stared down the administration once, the E.U. tonight is saying its stared down the President and won once. One wonders if they're going to feel like they have to give in.

BURNS: Yes and look, the trouble for the administration is the flip side of the coin of all of these countries coming right is how do you handle within 90 days, 70 plus countries making phone calls? I don't know how many hands Scott Bessent has, but I think this is going to be a really difficult process that they've gotten themselves in. They are saying they are going to do this on a case-by-case basis. Every deal is going to be different. I mean, it takes a long time to strike one of those deals, let alone 70 plus.

BERMAN: Dasha Burns, Richard Quest, Jennifer Welch, it's great to see all of you. Thank you very much.

Next, the impact on all this that its having on voters in one state, including a beekeeper and three time Trump voter .

And later, the President uses his executive order pen to personally target two of his critics, accusing one of them of treason.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:22:59]

BERMAN: All right, so far, much of the discussion on the President's tariffs and his backed down today has come in units of a trillion as in trillions of dollars on a grand scale. But it's hitting on a smaller scale, still with big impact in communities and industries across the country. Randi Kaye headed to North Carolina to speak with the voters impacted there.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIM HARTMAN, FARMER: We want to have as many bees as we can to make honey.

RANDI KAYE, CNN REPORTER (voice over):At Secret Garden Bees, a honey farm in Linden, North Carolina. Farmer Jim Hartman has one eye on his bees and the other on his bank account.

HARTMAN: Ideally, well get 100 pounds of honey per hive per year. KAYE (on camera): How do you feel about paying more for things?

HARTMAN: Well, you know, if you find someone who says, I'm happy about paying more for something, you point them out to me.

People who already couldn't afford fresh vegetables, who couldn't already afford to put good food on their plate, are the ones that are really going to be hurt by this.

KAYE (on camera): Did you ever think when you voted for President Trump, that things were going to cost you more and you're going to lose money?

HARTMAN: I never thought I was going to lose this much money this fast.

KAYE (voice over): Jim is a Republican who voted for Donald Trump three times.

KAYE (on camera): How do you feel about your vote for Donald Trump now?

HARTMAN: Well, I feel like perhaps I should have considered some other options.

KAYE (voice over): Among other things, Jim imports packaging supplies for his honey, so he's paying real close attention to the tariffs Trump just put in place

HARTMAN: We just bought our year supply of bottles from Taiwan, and our year supply of corks from Portugal about three weeks ago. So that would have been another $5,000.00 or $6,000.00 out of my pocket.

KAYE (voice over): Which is partly why he's repairing instead of replacing this 40-year-old forklift.

HARTMAN: The cost of equipment has just gone through the roof to buy anything like that, because it just would be cost prohibitive.

KAYE (voice over): He's also holding off on improvements around the farm.

HARTMAN: We're not going to hire any more people, that's for sure.

KAYE (voice over): Its more than just the tariffs. For the past two years, Jim has been selling honey to the federal government, which then provides it to schools and food banks. But after Donald Trump took office, the USDA cut those programs suddenly as part of the federal government's effort to streamline spending.

[20:25:13]

HARTMAN: For a lot of other local farmers around here, it was a major source of reliable revenue. For me, I know, it's going to cost me around $150,000.00 a year.

KAYE (on camera): A $150,000.00.

HARTMAN: Roughly 50 percent of my revenue.

KAYE (on camera): That's a huge hit.

HARTMAN: That's a massive hit.

KAYE (voice over): Not far from Jim's farm, we found other Trump supporters who give the President high marks on tariffs. How do you feel about the tariffs?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, I feel like for years we're being ripped off and -- why not make it fair? You know, zero, zero and I think Trump was upfront about it. He said were going to hurt some now.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think some of the countries are going they're going -- they're already starting to come around. It's going to be good. I really believe that.

KAYE (on camera): Do you have faith in Trump?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes I do.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think he's doing the right thing. In order for us to get back where we need to be, he needs to get the money somewhere. And they're charging us, why not charge them?

KAYE (voice over): Back at Jim's farm, though, still plenty of worry. He says raw honey is considered a luxury good, similar to organic vegetables -- as prices rise --

HARTMAN: I don't know what that's going to do to consumer spending.

KAYE (voice over): Trump paused the majority of the tariffs for 90 days after we left Jim's farm. Jim told us by phone, its flip flopped so many times you can't take it to the bank. Who knows what it will be next week? Adding, it seems like he's heard the American people.

Randi Kaye, CNN, Linden, North Carolina.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: All right, I want to bring in CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten. Harry, a week of turmoil now. So how do Americans feel about these tariffs?

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR DATA REPORTER: They don't like them, John. They don't like them. Opposition is well up from where it was in January and January, it was south 50 percent, it was only 46 percent. You look at it now 54 percent. Trump is losing the messaging battle. And one of the ways we know that Trump is losing the messaging battle is, do folks feel that these tariffs are going to hurt the economy?

The vast majority believe that it will hurt the economy short term. North of 70 percent. But more than that, Trump is saying, stick with me. Stick with me, right. Over the long term, things will get better. But even there, a majority of folks believe over the long term that the tariffs will hurt the economy. Just no good numbers from Trump from these polls.

BERMAN: Yes, vast majority say really bad short term, but even a majority say bad in the long term. How has this affected the overall feeling toward the President?

ENTEN: Yes. Let's talk about the economic approval ratings right of Donald Trump. That was a strength of his in the first term, he came in with a net approval rating on the economy on the plus side, plus six points. Look at where its fallen to now down all the way into the gutter. Well, south of minus ten points, it is the worst that a President has ever been on the economy at this point in their term.

And then how does it overall impact his approval rating? Right. What are we talking about? There are only two presidents who have net approval ratings negative at this point. One of them was Donald Trump in his first term and the other one, Donald Trump in his second term. Donald Trump setting records of the type that you simply put, don't want to set.

BERMAN: Harry Enten, great to see you tonight. I'm sure I'll see you in the morning.

ENTEN: You might see me.

BERMAN: I literally saw you more than my wife today.

All right, coming up, more breaking news. The President says he will use the Department of Justice to target former officials who were critical of him during his first term in office.

And later, the financial fallout from the President's tariffs has his critics and even some supporters questioning his business bonafides. We'll take a deeper dive.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:32:35]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN CO-HOST OF "ANDERSON COOPER 360": All right. More breaking news. President Trump has signed executive orders calling on the Justice Department to investigate two former officials who were critical of him during his first term. One is Miles Taylor. He had honestly wrote an op-ed in The New York Times in 2018 saying he was part of the resistance to Trump's presidency. The other was Chris Krebs, a cybersecurity official who angered the president in 2020 for doing his job. He reassured the American public in the wake of the 2020 election that it was "The most secure in American history." The President went after both of them today in the Oval Office starting with allegations against Miles Taylor.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I think it's a very important case and I think he's guilty of treason if you want to know the truth, but we'll find out. And I assume we're recommending this to the Department of Justice.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes sir.

TRUMP: We're going to find out about this guy too, because this guy is a wise guy. He said, we proved this is the most secure election in the history of our country. No, this was a disaster.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: With us is CNN's Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig and John Miller, CNN's Chief Law Enforcement and Intelligence Analyst. So Elie, what does this mean for Miles Taylor and Chris Krebs?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, look, it's big trouble for them. I mean, let's be real here because ordinarily, this is something a president would never do, has never done, which is issue a formal proclamation saying, I order you, the Justice Department to open a criminal investigation of these two individuals. Now, what's missing from the proclamation is any evidence, any indication that either of these people committed a crime.

You just heard some of the general language. If you look at the proclamations, the big accusation is they're "bad faith players." But let me --

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Wise guys.

HONIG: Wise guys, right? I mean, not a crime. Here's the thing though. The ball is now in Pam Bondi's court and she has shown us where her loyalties sit, with the administration, by her refusal to even look into the Signal controversy. Even if she opens an investigation and finds no crimes, that's a big deal. Getting investigated is stressful. It's terrifying, it's costly. It can damage reputations. So this is very serious. This retribution tour has gotten personal and very dark now.

BERMAN: John, technically the DOJ exactly, who does the investigation here?

MILLER: So the Department of Justice doesn't do investigations. They oversee legal matters and prosecutions. If there's an investigation, DOJ would refer it to the FBI. And as Elie pointed out, the executive order lacks a specific allegation of what they're supposed to investigate, but there is something in the middle in both cases where it says, you know, or if they revealed classified material.

[20:35:00]

In Chris Krebs' case, there's no specific allegation about that. What the president said in Miles Taylor's case was, you know, he wrote a book. Well, that gives them a document to go through and, you know, because it was written as anonymous, because it was likely not submitted for pre-publication review by anonymous, if there is something that they deemed classified in there, that could be a vulnerability for him. BERMAN: Elie, you brought up the Attorney General Pam Bondi, let's remind people what she said in her confirmation hearing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAM BONDI, UNITED STATES ATTORNEY GENERAL: Politics have got to be taken out of the system.

SEN. CHRIS COONS, (D-DE) SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: I agree with you.

BONDI: This department has been weaponized for years and years and years. And it has to stop.

COONS: But let me, if I might --

BONDI: My oath would be to support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. The people of America would be my client. So, will everyone be held to an equal, equal, fair system of justice if I am the next attorney general? Absolutely. And no one is above the law.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So she's got a decision to make.

HONIG: Yeah. Fine rhetoric there, but she's not lived up to that whatsoever. Any half decent, halfway independent attorney general, prosecutor knows you cannot open an investigation without what we call predication. Meaning some -- it's a low bar, but it's an important bar, meaning some good faith basis to believe that a crime has occurred.

By the way, this happened in a less formal manner under Bill Barr. A guy I was very critical of. I wrote my first book criticizing him. But Donald Trump from time to time would go on social media and say, I want Barack Obama and Joe Biden and John Kerry locked up. You know what Bill Barr did? To his credit, in comparison, he'd let it go. He'd ignore it. Like a parent with a child having a tantrum. He just let the tantrum pass. But he never used DOJ as an offensive weapon. This is going to be a crucial test for Pam Bondi.

BERMAN: You know, we are talking about Chris Krebs and the job he had leading cybersecurity. You know, a lot of that's been dismantled under Trump.

MILLER: And is continuing to be taken apart piece by piece. So if you look at it, what Chris Krebs says was, we had Russian interference or an attempt to interfere with an earlier election that was documented. You know, we put in security layers and layers and layers, which is the basis for which he said, we at CISA, the FBI, the CIA, the DOD and the Election Assistance Commission issued a joint statement saying that these layers protected the 2020 election.

All of those layers have been decimated. CISA has gone through layoffs. Its most experienced people, and its newest, smartest people have been laid off in the dozens, contracts have been canceled. The Head of the Cyber Command at NSA, also the Head of the NSA and his Deputy have both been fired. The FBI unit, the task force that works on election interference was dismantled. So, it's interesting to see that the person who, for all best information we have, did his best to protect the 2020 elections is being investigated for having done that and that everything that could protect future elections is being taken apart.

BERMAN: Elie, any recourse that Miles Taylor and Chris Krebs now have?

HONIG: So, the sad reality is there is no way to prevent an investigation. There's no such thing as going into court and saying, judge, I want you to order DOJ or the FBI not to investigate me or to stop an investigation. All they can do really is play defense and hope for the best. But I do want to say this, if they are indicted, Donald Trump has handed them a readymade defense of selective prosecution. It's rare, but when you issue a decree, a presidential decree singling them out for their speech, for their politics, you're teeing up that defense.

BERMAN: Yeah, I mean, executive order seems to be textbook (inaudible).

MILLER: I think you need to look at this other piece, which is, if you sent this over to the FBI under any former director, they would take a look at it and say, this is not a thing. The Director and the Deputy Director, Kash Patel and Dan Bongino are both political operatives from Donald Trump and his campaign who have been appointed to these jobs, who said publicly we're going to use the law to go after people who were critics and who were enemies of the Trump regime.

So, this is not your independent FBI that's taken this on and people in the FBI who achieved results that the president didn't like during the time he was out of office were all summarily fired. So it's going to be really interesting and worrisome to watch how this goes through the system of supposedly an independent Justice Department and an independent FBI, which appears not to be either.

BERMAN: Well, we'll be watching very closely. John Miller, Elie Honig, great to see you both. So, a closer look in light of the tariff turmoil at the president's business acumen and we're about 20 minutes away from the CNN Town Hall with Independent Senator Bernie Sanders moderated by Anderson.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:44:38]

BERMAN: Again, the breaking news from the top of the hour. Stocks soaring after President Trump put a 90-day pause on most of his tariffs, but not backing down with China and put a stiffer 125 percent tariff on those imports. His critics and even some supporters are questioning his moves leading up to today's pause. For decades before he was president, Mr. Trump made his name as a flashy CEO of his own company and then a reality TV star.

[20:45:00] And while he always projected enormous success, bragging about how rich he was to anyone who would listen, underneath his gold-plated apartment and bravado was a business that did struggle at times. One of his companies, Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts, never turned a profit, lost money every year of its existence and filed for bankruptcy. One of at least four declared bankruptcies for Trump's businesses.

With us now is Russ Buettner. He's an Investigator Reporter for The New York Times and co-author of the book " Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father's Fortune and Created The Illusion of Success" And it is those last words, 'the illusion of success' that I want to sort of lay over what happened today because the president was gloating about the market rise today, which was substantial, but it came after even bigger drops.

RUSS BUETTNER, INVESTIGATOR REPORTER, THE NEW YORK TIMES: That is definitely a part of a trend of his career in business. I think if you studied his career in business, you wouldn't be surprised by anything that's happened with him as president. One situation that you're talking about, where he sort of declares victory from the jaws of defeat, if you will, came in the mid 1980s when he encouraged, he bought a USFL team, an upstart football team, football league, and convinced the other owners that they had to go head to head with the NFL, that they had to move their season from the spring to the fall.

The U.S. owners hired a consultant from McKinsey who said, this is insane, you will kill the league. Donald Trump said, no, we have to do it. They did it. He killed the league.

(LAUGH)

BUETTNER: It was dead. There was a big lawsuit. He had -- I think he got $1 from the lawsuit because the court ruled, yes, it was a monopoly, but it didn't matter because the NFL owners hadn't done anything wrong and it was clear they always owned the fall.

BERMAN: So in this case, he imposes these tariffs. He has a whole lot of economists telling him and allies, even donors, this is a bad idea. This will hurt the economy. He does it anyway. Then he reverses and says he won.

BUETTNER: That's right. That's the way you play it.

(LAUGH)

BUETTNER: And he will often attack the messenger in that situation as well. He won't actually address the message. He'll just attack the messenger.

BERMAN: Do you have a sense of what his thought process is the whole time here? Does he think he can just outmaneuver the reality that everyone else is presenting to him?

BUETTNER: That's a great question. I think you have to get in his head. I'm not sure if we can do that, but I would say the pattern throughout his life is that he believes he has an innate expertise in all things. And so, he doesn't really heed the advice of experts. When he was opening up his biggest casino, there was an analyst who wrote that he would have to make $1 million a day in profit to support the debt he was taking on.

Donald Trump got that analyst fired, laid him out in filth in the press. The analyst was exactly right. Six months later, it was those numbers that brought Donald Trump to his heels and made him collapse. It's just, it's part not paying attention to experts is a huge occurrence throughout his entire life.

BERMAN: Will he ever admit he's wrong?

BUETTNER: He never admits he's wrong. No. He will blame others. He will reframe it as a defeat or he will just attack.

BERMAN: So again, the title of the book is "Lucky Loser" indicating that there are times you think that there were failures and you know, kept moving up with each time. In this case though, his business is America, right? So, what would fail here in order for him to move up? In other words, what would he potentially be sacrificing?

BUETTNER: Well, he may already have moved up, right? He was president once before and then he lost an election and here he is back again, and he lost that election because people were really unhappy I think with his judgment and ability. It seems that he has to sort of have his nose rubbed in the failure to be able to move on. I'm not good at forecasting, but --

BERMAN: Right.

BUETTNER: Look, if all this goes against him and the populace and the Republican Party turns against him a little bit, that would be a big change.

BERMAN: Is it -- based on what you've seen, do you think enough people are telling him no, that he would ever move on? Or do you think he'll go back at it?

BUETTNER: I don't think we've seen any evidence of that so far. The Republican Party is following right in line so far. There's some complaints, I think from Senators who have big agricultural industries, but not much.

BERMAN: And again, just finally, because he calls himself, always has such a great businessman. To what extent do you think he understands all aspects of what he claims to be talking about, whether it is business? I mean, clearly, he understands golf. There are things he knows a lot about, but does he always know as much as he says he does?

BUETTNER: I think he's really not an in-depth study on anything. He's always bragged that he goes by instinct. He believes he has a great capacity for science because he had an uncle that was a scientist. That may tell you all you need to know. He doesn't really study the finances of business. He makes things the way he wants them to look and then assumes the money will follow. BERMAN: All right. Russ Buettner, thank you so much. Interesting to think about all the work you've done and, like I said, lay it over what we've seen in the last few days. Appreciate your help.

So just a few minutes from now, Anderson will moderate a live CNN Town Hall with Independent Senator Bernie Sanders. The Senator has been traveling around the country with some Democratic lawmakers on what is known as their Fighting Oligarchy Tour. They're looking for a path forward in this new Trump administration and we're going to talk about it with a Republican and a Democrat ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:54:43]

BERMAN: We are just minutes away from CNN's Town Hall with Independent Senator Bernie Sanders. Senator Sanders has been on the road for his Fighting Oligarchy Tour with Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez taking aim at President Trump and Elon Musk. It obviously comes at a time when Democrats are looking to chart a new path forward.

[20:55:00]

With us now Republican Strategist, Brad Todd, and Former Special Advisor to President Obama, Van Jones. Van, Bernie Sanders has been packing him in on this tour. There's a lot of energy there, but he is not a young man. So broadly speaking, what do you think Bernie Sanders represents for the future of the Democratic Party?

VAN JONES IS A CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I think he represents the kind of frontal assault, trying to hold our Democratic norms in place. He's not going to be running for president, not successfully. But he's trying to hold the line and say, listen, there's a reason America is so rich. Even our poor people are rich compared to poor people any place else because we have a system of government where rich folks don't get a chance to seek in government and wire everything for themselves and send in their friends with laptops. That's not how we do things in America.

So, but I think really what you should be looking at is that young woman right next to him, AOC, I think is getting the alley-oop from Bernie Sanders. Bernie Sanders is Scotty Pippen, AOC is going to be Michael Jordan, and she's going to be doing the slam dunk in about four years.

BERMAN: So, Brad, I think people watching this ask this question as they see you. Why is this man smiling? Brad Todd, why are you smiling?

BRAD TODD, GOP MEDIA CONSULTANT AND STRATEGIST: Well, I'll tell you what, if Bernie Sanders and AOC want to travel around the country and become the face of the Democratic Party, as Republicans, we're willing to buy the jet fuel. I'd hope they'd go to every swing Congressional district next year. He's a grouchy old socialist and she's as far left as you can get. So, I will -- if they're the face of the Democratic Party, Democrats didn't learn anything from losing. BERMAN: OK. Van, what about that and what can, in your mind, should Senator Sanders say tonight to Anderson that would appeal to voters who aren't necessarily part of that more progressive wing of the party?

JONES: Well, I think what Bernie Sanders represents and AOC represents is a different kind of populism. You have kind of a negative populism from Donald Trump. I'm populous because I'm mad at immigrants and I'm mad at Chinese people, and I'm mad at woke, and I'm mad, I'm mad. I think, this is a more positive populism saying, look, I'm a populist because I want ordinary people, everyday people to be able to rise.

But I agree, I don't think they would be a successful general election ticket. But I think that they are giving Democrats a way to hold back some of this, you know, unfettered stuff from Donald Trump. Watch Ezra Klein and his ideas about abundance. He's looking for a third way out. Watch Corey Booker, watch other people, they'll take advantage of the fact that AOC and Bernie are pushing back so hard, but they're going to open up space for a third way out.

BERMAN: The timing on this, Brad, is interesting, right? Because obviously, there's a lot that has happened the last few days in the country and President Trump retreated today on something that he did care deeply about. One wonders if this does provide, Brad, a window for Democrats to go after the President a little bit in a way that maybe they couldn't before.

TODD: Well, Bernie Sanders certainly can. I don't think he retreated on China tariffs today, by the way, he increased them. Bernie Sanders has been for tariffs on China for his entire life. He opposed PNTR in 2000. He tried to withdraw from PNTR in 2005 and he proposed new tariffs on China just two years ago. He has in fact said many of the same things Donald Trump has said, and if Bernie had his way, we wouldn't buy any goods from countries with lower wages than us.

So, I'm going to find it real interesting to see how he criticizes Trump on a policy he has long supported.

BERMAN: China aside though, you do acknowledge there was a retreat on just about everything else?

TODD: Well, look, I think what happened is President Trump realized that he can have a trade war with China, but he can't have a trade war with the entire world. And as long as the other countries are trying to lower barriers and make things fair, he should retreat. He should pull back. And I think you're not going to see any disagreement with that among people who want fairer trade.

China is a different story. China is the big villain in the world economy, and I think you see a lot of bipartisan support for getting tough on China with tariffs. And that's why Bernie Sanders is not going to criticize that much tonight.

BERMAN: Van, is China a better villain than everybody? Which sort of was the case over the last few days with the president's tariffs. JONES: Look, I mean, Donald Trump stepped on 15 rakes, and, you know, fell on his face and destroyed the stock market and had to back off. Yes, look, if you want to focus on China and keep China isolated, you don't attack everybody else and drive them into the arms of China. We had India with us, now India is crawling over to China. We had Japan with us, they're crawling over to China because Donald Trump has been acting completely erratic.

So, yes, it's much better to focus on China and let the rest of world be our friends than piss off everybody except for Vladimir Putin and hope it all works out.

BERMAN: In 10 seconds or less, and I mean this, Brad, do you think Americans will have a long memory on this, or short memory?

TODD: Well, I think it's going to be end as it ends, right? Americans are going to look at how things end and if it's lower trade barriers as a result of this, they'll be happy.

BERMAN: All right. Brad, Van, I thank you both very much. It's a very good preview of what we are about to see over the course of the next hour, this special event, CNN's Town Hall --