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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Trump-Musk Bromance Ends, Feud Explodes into Bitter Attacks; Trump-Musk Alliance Goes Up in Flames in Epic Personal Attacks; Musk Claims To Drop "Big Bomb", Alleges Trump Is In "Epstein Files"; White House: "This Is An Unfortunate Episode From Elon"; Russia Launches Aerial On Kyiv Days After Ukraine's Audacious Drone Attack On Bomber Fleet; George Clooney To Star In Live Performance Of His Play Saturday Night At 7PM ET On CNN. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired June 05, 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: ... phone showing she was weighing mushrooms days before that fatal ones and an expert said those mushrooms looked a lot like death caps, Erin and then she deleted the photos but she told police it's because she didn't want to implicate herself, she just thought they'd be used against her.
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: It's incredible. All right, thank you so much, Will Ripley. And I do want to note, when we talked about this story earlier we showed video of the suspect's family, not the suspect. I'll show you of course who Erin Patterson is the suspect in the murder mushroom trial. Thanks so much for joining us. Anderson starts now.
[20:00:33]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "ANDERSON COOPER: 360": Tonight on 360, Elon Musk and Donald Trump's very public breakup, loud, full of threats and allegations, how it happened and what the fallout is right now.
Also tonight, breaking news. Moscow responds with missiles to Ukraine's devastating drone strike on Russia's strategic bomber fleet.
And later, George Clooney on the life and legacy of legendary newsman Edward R. Murrow. As CNN prepares to broadcast his play "Good Night and Good Luck" live on Saturday night.
Good evening. It may not have been surprising to some, but the breakup between the world's richest man and the President of the United States and the very public sniping back and forth between them all day long is still, to many, shocking. In the space of just a few hours, both on camera and on their respective social networks. The two billionaires, who had once been nearly joined at the hip, tore into one another.
By the time it got going, Elon musk, who once literally jumped for joy at being in Donald Trump's presence and who once said, "I love Donald Trump as much as a straight man can love another man" was calling for his impeachment and suggesting he shared a dark past with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. And the President, who had just last Friday given Musk a golden key in gratitude for his service at DOGE, was threatening his government contracts and calling him crazy. It was in that meeting last Friday, just six days ago, that they said their public and somewhat awkward goodbyes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Elon is really not leaving. He's going to be back and forth, I think. I have a feeling.
ELON MUSK, ENTREPRENEUR, OWNER OF TESLA AND SPACEX: Well, I expect to continue to provide advice whenever the President would like advice.
TRUMP: I hope so.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: But by Tuesday, things began to turn. Musk described the President's tax and spending bill, now before the Senate, as a, "disgusting abomination." He did not criticize the President directly, nor did the President personally attack Musk when he responded yesterday. But that changed today in a big way.
It started off with Musk in one post after another, continuing to criticize the bill, and there had been reports that the President was unhappy about those criticisms. But the key turning point today occurred during this meeting between the President and the newly elected Chancellor of Germany, Friedrich Merz.
The President, when asked by a reporter about Musk's criticisms of the bill, said this, referring to that Friday goodbye with Musk.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: You saw a man who was very happy when he stood behind the Oval Desk and even with the blackeye, I said, do you want a little makeup? Well get you a little makeup. But he said, no, I don't think so. Which is interesting. Elon and I had a great relationship. I don't know if we will anymore.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Well then a few minutes later, in response to another question about Musk, the President went further, making it almost exclusively personal.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I think he misses the place. He's not the first. People leave my administration, and then at some point they miss it so badly, and some of them embrace it and some of them actually become hostile. I don't know what it is. It's sort of Trump derangement syndrome.
(END VIDEO CLIP) COOPER: The President also repeated a talking point used by Speaker Johnson that Musk only opposes the bill because it eliminated the electric vehicle tax credit, which would negatively affect Tesla.
Now, the President said these comments several minutes after noon Eastern Time. Unclear if Musk was watching them live or heard or read about them after the fact, but by 12:46, Musk was posting on his platform X, and this time directly mentioning the President: "Without me, Trump would have lost the election," he wrote, "Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate."
Less than two hours later, the President fired back with this: "Elon was wearing thin. I asked him to leave. I took away his E.V. mandate that forced everyone to buy electric cars that nobody else wanted, that he knew for months I was going to do, and he just went crazy."
At about the same time, the President also wrote, "The easiest way to save money in our budget, billions and billions of dollars, is to terminate Elon's governmental subsidies and contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn't do it."
Now, Musk doesn't respond -- didn't respond to that right away. Instead, just a half hour later, he posted this "Time to drop the really big bomb @real Donald Trump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT."
Musk would soon repost a link to a video clip from MSNBC. In the clip, a much younger and single citizen Trump is seen at a 1992 party talking with Jeffrey Epstein and another man. Between the two Epstein related posts, Musk also reposted a call for the President's impeachment and removal from office, adding his own one word comment. "Yes."
He also posted this prediction, "The Trump tariffs will cause a recession in the second half of this year," and he responded to the President's threat to his business, quoting now, "In light of the President's statement about cancellation of my government contracts, SpaceX will begin decommissioning its Dragon Spacecraft immediately."
The Dragon is used to ferry astronauts to and from the International Space Station. As if all of this was not surreal enough, Kanye West also tried some online mediation, posting an emoji of the two men hugging with the words, "Bros, please know we love you both so much." And yes, that actually happened.
Unclear, if anything, about the relationship between Musk and Trump is salvageable. Stunning when you consider what we've seen between them over the last few months.
[20:05:40]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: He's the only reason we can now send American astronauts into space. Come here, take over, Elon, just take them.
MUSK: I'm not just MAGA, I'm dark gothic MAGA.
TRUMP: We love Elon, don't we? He's that guy -- He's a character.
MUSK: The true test of someone's character is how they behave under fire and we had one President who couldn't climb a flight of stairs and another who was fist pumping after getting shot. Fight, fight, fight.
TRUMP: He's an incredible patriot, and I don't even know if he's a Republican.
MUSK: If we have a great President like Donald Trump...
TRUMP: We have a new star. A star is born. Elon.
MUSK: Well, I think President Trump likes to get things done.
TRUMP: We appreciate it. Everybody here, even this side, appreciates it.
MUSK: President Trump has put together, I think, the best Cabinet ever, literally.
TRUMP: We have the best computer guy there is, right. We have Elon. We have here --
MUSK: Thank you.
TRUMP: --a very special that I give to very special people. Thank you, Elon.
MUSK: Thank you.
TRUMP: Take care of yourself.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: That was then. As of late today, the Tesla Musk gave the President was still, or I guess the President that bought was still on the premises parked outside the White House. Low on mileage, but high on memories of a bromance seemingly gone by.
Late today, the White House reacted to the Epstein allegations in a statement to CNN. It reads in part: "This is an unfortunate episode from Elon who was unhappy with the One Big Beautiful Bill because it does not include the policies he wanted."
For more on what was even by Washington standards, an extraordinary day, were joined first by CNN chief White House correspondent, Kaitlan Collins, who anchors "The Source" at the top of the next hour.
I mean, we laid out what happened in front of the cameras on social media. What do you -- what are your sources telling you about behind the scenes?
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: I mean, this day, just the messages alone today, hearing from White House officials, you know, normally you're texting people and saying, what about this on the tariffs or this on Iran? You didn't even have to, you know, say what you were asking about today because everyone just knew what was happening. It was kind of this mixture of amusement and horror inside the West Wing.
COOPER: It wasn't that people, some peoples greatest fear, fears of like a of a unlocked Elon Musk just slamming the White House.
COLLINS: But also they're not surprised to a degree. And that's not because of what's been happening the last few months. Its what's been happening the last few days. Very rarely is someone able to criticize President Trump and just go unscathed and have nothing commented on from Truth Social by him on this. And for the last several days he has said nothing as Elon Musk has continued to pile on to this bill to urge people not only to vote against it, to just outright kill it and start over.
And that changed obviously, today, where the President was saying, well, he hasn't commented on me personally. And then you saw how that escalated. And I think White House officials this week had been watching since we were in the middle of the briefing two days ago when Elon Musk first tweeted about this bill and Karoline Leavitt, the Press Secretary, was responding to it there to now she's having to respond to Elon Musk saying that Trump is included in the Epstein files.
And so, what is remarkable to me, though, is these are officials who have been defending Elon Musk on the record or on background for the last several months amid DOGE. And now they're caught in this moment where there is a mixture of Elon Musk allies inside the White House and the administration, and then the Trump diehards who now are wrestling, you know, being in the middle of this and watching all of this play out with the stakes as high as they could potentially be.
I mean, he's the world's most powerful man and the world, the richest man who before it was kind of assumed one person had remarked to me a few months ago that it was mutually assured destruction, that they'd never fall out because they were just, you know, needed each other too much. And now we're witnessing it happen. And it's a real question of what happens here.
I did talk to people who thought, you know, anything can be brokered with Trump, anything can be fixed. The Epstein files tweet from Elon Musk seemed to be a tipping point to where people think that maybe it can't be repaired.
COOPER: Kaitlan Collins, thanks. We'll see you at the top of the hour.
A few journalists have as much insight into Elon Musk as CNN contributor Kara Swisher. In fact, she predicted that the Trump-Musk alliance would not end well. Kara is host of the "On" podcast and co- host with Scott Galloway of the "Pivot" podcast. She's also the author of "Burn Book: A Tech Love Story". Kara joins me now. I just want to get your initial reaction to the fallout from today as you as you watch this happen in real time. KARA SWISHER, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, in the words of Neil Sedaka, the immortal words "breaking up is hard to do," I guess. I don't, you know, I was -- I expected this with these two. They were inevitably going to clash. Especially as Elon was getting forced out of the White House and that's really what was happening before he was moved to the side. His numbers were low and, you know, at some point it was going to break and Elon outside the tent is not good as I said earlier, last week to you, is not a good Elon to have.
[20:10:23]
COOPER: By the way, I had Neil Sedaka on the program on Tuesday. I know you probably didn't know that you made a Neil Sedaka reference.
I want to play something -- I want to play something that you said back in November, just days after President Trump's election victory.
SWISHER: Yes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SWISHER: With Elon, it'll be interesting to see what happens. I do think they're going to clash. They're too much alike as people. I think -- I've talked to a number of Republicans who spent some time with him recently, and all of them are like, oh, you were right about his personality. Once you get a taste of that in the extreme, I think Trump and he will clash, hundred percent.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Where do you think this goes? I mean, I don't know whose interests -- do they have interests in continuing it? I mean, it's kind of hard to imagine.
SWISHER: No, I mean, Elon's lost $152 billion today. The Tesla stock is down that much and obviously Starlink -- there's some risks around Starlink because they have so many government contracts. Tesla was already in a freefall in a lot of ways and having a lot of trouble.
I don't -- I think Kaitlan's right that Epstein, I was surprised, a lot of people were saying, oh, this is all a stunt, like wrestling or something. But the Epstein tweet, when I saw that, I was like, oh, he's just -- he's going nuclear, and he's just decided to pull away.
COOPER: Because, I mean, in the world of MAGA and conspiracy world, that is, you know, that's like the, I don't know, the ark of the covenant hidden in some warehouse is this Epstein file, you know, and there are these phony flight logs which are constantly being changed. If anybody criticizes Trump, your name would appear on these flight logs. For him to use the Epstein card, it just seemed -- I mean, that's throwing all the cards on the table.
SWISHER: Absolutely and that's what Musk is about. One of the great things about Musk is he's a huge risk taker. One of the negative things about Musk is he's a huge risk taker. And so he's just decided he doesn't care at all. And this is really interesting to see if it will sort of get others to sort of push back at Trump, because if this guy does it, maybe we can do it. I think it might give people courage in a weird way, although it's going to come at great cost to Elon Musk.
And at the same time he was, you know, he was all in with Trump and wanted and had that weird, you know, staying at Mar-a-Lago. A lot of it got a little strange, honestly and people in the White House were always like, you know, wow, what a strange person. I said, I told you and it was going to wear thin. And that's I think, I think wear thin is actually quite accurate as Trump was saying. At the same time, Trump used him like magnificently.
COOPER: Well, that was my question. Did he get used by Donald Trump? I mean, was he used as a fall guy? I mean, you know, he took all this heat on DOGE. He made all these wild, you know, predictions. He was going to save $2 trillion, you know, nothing like that. A lot of his figures turned out to be phony, that they posted on the wall of receipts. Was he used by the President?
SWISHER: Of course, who doesn't get used by Donald Trump? He does that with a lot of people he's had -- there's a long list of people out the door and Elon was just the latest in the biggest.
You know, the issue is that this is someone who has some means and, and methods to do something about it, right. This is not Omarosa or someone else that gets tossed out, tossed out by Trump or whoever it happens to be. He has some ability to do something about it, and I don't know what he's going to do. He talked about a second, a third party. He did a poll on Twitter today.
This guy, you know, you think Trump can be petty, Elon Musk can be petty. And I think in a way that's really probably dangerous in many ways and could do all manner of things t, hurt Trump. And he has a lot of fans himself, by the way, even though his numbers are lower, he certainly has a huge platform, a huge influence, has a lot of money and so, and Trump, of course, can attack him all manner of ways through the Justice Department, through investigations. Impugning him, I suspect he'll bring up some drug related things soon enough. So, we'll see if they'll continue, if they'll realize this is not just mutually assured destruction. It will hurt both of them really badly.
COOPER: Well, I wonder if this if the Afrikaners continue to get special visas after this.
SWISHER: Maybe not.
COOPER: What are the ripple effects of this? I mean, it's not -- normally one wouldn't think of like, okay, well, now the Presidents going to use these levers that have never been used before, but we've seen him use levers against law firms and schools and stuff. So why wouldn't -- he could go after Starlink contracts.
SWISHER: He did, he said that on the contracts. He said it, he said it explicitly. But Elon's like, fine. Do you want the astronauts to pick it up at the space station? Do you want those satellites in the air? I mean, there's a lot of stuff that Musk does, especially in space, that is critically important at this moment and sort of speaks to the issue as we don't have enough competition, right, that we need the government needs a lot of ability to not just rely on one person, but there's a lot of damage Donald Trump can do.
Elon musk at the same time, vice versa, and this guy, he goes hard. Let's just say he goes hard. And he's -- now he's angry. And you don't, you know, like Hulk you don't want to see -- you don't like me when I'm angry. And so, that could be problematic for Donald Trump and the Republicans who had supported Musk so much.
You know, they couldn't they -- they knocked themselves over to get a picture with this guy just a couple months ago.
[20:15:34]
COOPER: Is it possible that this is an attempt by Musk to kind of, I mean, to help his businesses, to help his, you know, to show he's broken from Trump and kind of returning to Silicon Valley and not focusing on politics.
SWISHER: No. Yes, there's a lot of like it's a conspiracy theory of -- everything's a conspiracy theory, it's ridiculous. This doesn't help him in any way.
And by the way, if you're someone who was used to buy his cars, he still cut USAID. He still helped affect a lot of people in bad ways. You're not going to suddenly go, oh, he doesn't like Trump. I think I'll buy a Tesla again, you know? No, I don't think he's really alienated his customers. It doesn't make him better because he doesn't -- he's in a fight with Donald Trump. It just is, you know, pick your highlander and then see which one survives. But yes, it's going to be pretty ugly.
COOPER: He's alienated his customers. He's also alienated. now the person who he alienated his customers for. Kara Swisher thank you very much.
SWISHER: Right, exactly.
COOPER: Appreciate it. Coming up next, with the legislation in the center of all this now before the senate, more on how today's eruption might affect its chances and what it could mean going forward for the President's party.
Also, CNN's Donie O'Sullivan, with a closer look at the Jeffrey Epstein episode that Elon Musk dredged up in the political conspiracy theories surrounding it.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:21:14]
COOPER: We're focusing tonight about the fallout from a falling out of operatic proportions between Donald Trump and Elon Musk. It is personal, as it now seems to be, the roots of it are in politics and policy, namely, the President's bill affecting millions of Americans and the taxes they'll pay. And for an estimated nearly 11 million, according to the Congressional Budget Office, whether or not they'll lose health coverage.
CNN's Manu Raju spoke to several key congressional Republicans today on Capitol Hill.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): Elon is a friend. I sent him a lot of information by via text, hoping he reads it and considers it and this isn't personal. Policy differences should not be personal.
REP. THOMAS MASSIE (R-KY): I trust the math from the guy that lands rockets backwards over the politician's math. I think the patient is on life support and if the Senate thinks they're going to rehabilitate it and rewrite it. I think they're endangering this patient.
REP. TIM BURCHETT (R-TN): I had to go with Trump politically. You know, the two biggest dogs in the pound. They're going to turn on each other eventually.
REP. TROY NEHLS (R-TX): Should I go down there? I'll tell you what, Elon, this is what I'll do. Come down to Texas 22nd district, right. I'll pay your filing fee and run against me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Joining me now is Van Jones, CNN senior political commentator, former special adviser to President Obama, and David Axelrod, CNN chief political analyst and a former senior adviser to President Obama. David, many did expect a falling out between Trump and Elon Musk, it happened eventually. Did you think it would play out this soon? This publicly? This personally?
DAVID AXELROD, CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Oh my God. In a matter of days, we went from a gold key to Blackjacks and brass knuckles to nuclear weapons. I mean, it was this -- but you know what? When you look at the characters involved, is it all that surprising? First of all, let's set aside this these professions of love that we've heard in the past few months.
These are not sentimentalists. Elon Musk didn't become the richest man in the world by being a sentimentalist. Donald Trump did not become President of the United States by becoming a sentimentalist. They used each other and the currency they were interested in was power and they used each other to attain it. Musk voted for Joe Biden in 2020 by his own acknowledgment. And what happened was Biden did not invite him to a meeting of automakers in the White House. He was deeply offended. He moved away from Biden, moved into the Trump camp.
And so, you know, vengeance was a bit of the motive for him to come over in the first place. And he used the opportunity to gain power. And Trump handed to him the power and a bunch of gamers to run, to wreak havoc in the U.S. government. He put a guy who was deeply unstable, genius as he may be, he's not a genius about government, deeply unstable, with a bunch of kids who knew the value of -- the price of everything and the value of nothing. And were going to be digging out for years and generations from some of the things that they did.
So this was ill-fated from the beginning, but it was really about the power that Trump wanted and the power that Musk wanted, the reflected power of Trump. And so, you know, we ended up where we probably were always going to end up.
COOPER: Yes, Van.
VAN JONES, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, look, a couple of things, one is, you know, the power that Elon Musk still has is significant. Somebody said Trump has three and a half more years, Elon has 40. He's a billionaire. He's got a long term play.
COOPER: I believe it was Elon Musk who said that.
JONES: Exactly, Elon's correct. You good at math? But the other piece of it is those DOGE employees, the people that Axelrod was just talking about are very dangerous.
If Donald Trump is smart, the first thing he's going to do is fire, investigate and prosecute all of Elon's people who are all throughout government with their laptops downloading data right now, that's --
COOPER: Do you think he should prosecute them?
[20:25:18]
JONES: Listen, I don't think that what they're doing is legal. A lot of them don't have the proper clearances. And I think that if you investigate, you'll find they've uploaded data into servers that are that the wrong thing to do. So, I think there should definitely be an investigation there. If Donald Trump is smart, the leverage that that Elon has is he left his kids didn't. They're still in there.
So this fight, if it's going to be a fight that Donald Trump prevails on in the short term, go after DOGE long term, he's got to still the Republican Party to deal with an Elon Musk that's promising to spend money now in a decade from now.
COOPER: David, do you think Musk got played by Donald Trump? I mean, that he used I mean, you said they were both using each other. Who did it more effectively.
AXELROD: Well, I mean, Trump is President and that's what he wanted. Musk has actually suffered financially as a result of this. And it could be worse if Trump really leans in, I mean, he lost -- Tesla lost 14 percent of its value today because of this exchange between Trump and Musk.
So, I don't know that he got played, but Donald Trump, like I said, he's not a sentimentalist. He uses people, he uses everybody. And think he used Trump, but Musk -- but I think Musk used him as well. But we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that Musk does have, as Kara Swisher was just saying, quite a bit of power himself through the platform of X, through the money that he can spend. And the following, frankly, that he's built through this relationship with Trump, that he can now turn against him.
I think he's going to raise quite a bit of, of trouble around this bill that is already troubled on this issue now. You know, I think I said yesterday, if he's concerned about deficits, perhaps he should offer and suggest others who have the means to do it, that they should just go back to paying the tax rate they were paying a few years ago before this tax break. That would help solve some of these problems. I don't hear him saying that because he doesn't really believe in government. He thinks it's all a scam.
COOPER: It is been one of those situations where -- there's no idea how is this going to play out tomorrow.
JONES: No and also, you know, its King Kong versus Godzilla and when that -- when you got King Kong fighting Godzilla, who gets trampled on are the villagers. Don't forget, the reason they're fighting is because Donald Trump wants to devastate Medicare and Medicaid and other middle class programs, and Elon just wants to eliminate them.
So at the end of the day, this is a fight between two people whose fundamental policies would hurt a lot of Americans. Throw a lot of Americans off of health care, put a lot of people in the poorhouse. And so, we don't know who's going to win. But right now, the American people are losing. There's no version of this bill that's going to be good for ordinary Americans -- for everyday Americans.
COOPER: David, Musk floated the idea of creating a third political party again, that was, you know, one tweet in many of the day. I don't know how serious he is on that. That's certainly something that's been tried before. I mean, if he's really committed to that, do you think he could have an impact?
AXELROD: Well, look, if you put, you know, if you put billions of dollars behind something, you can have some impact. And I think what he's trying to do, you know, first of all, I don't know how much of what he's saying was really thought through today. What you saw today, as I said earlier, he is not a stable person. You've got Donald Trump, a very impulsive person himself. But Musk appears to me to be deeply unstable and it looked like he kind of got off the rails today and went from zero to a hundred really, really fast.
But I think, yes, I think if he puts a lot of money into it, he can create problems in any place where Republicans and Democrats run relatively close to each other.
COOPER: All right, David Axelrod, Van Jones, thanks so much.
Coming up next, the story behind Elon Musk's insinuations today about the President and Jeffrey Epstein.
Also, breaking news, what appears to be Russia's answer tonight to Ukraine's drone strike over the weekend.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [20:34:15]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: More on our breaking news. We've mentioned earlier during his very public fight with President Trump today, Elon Musk posted this, saying, "Time to drop the really big bomb. At RealDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT."
Musk was referring to the convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who died by suicide in 2019 while awaiting trial in federal sex trafficking charges. Musk then reposted a clip from MSNBC of Trump talking with Epstein at a party in 1992.
Now, the White House responded by calling Musk's claims a, quote, "unfortunate episode".
Joining us is CNN Senior Correspondent, Donie O'Sullivan, who's covered conspiracy theories relating to the Epstein case. I mean, for Trump to -- for Musk to drop the Epstein files into this is like a nuclear bomb in the --
DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Scrutinize (ph).
COOPER: -- conspiracy world.
O'SULLIVAN: Massive.
[20:35:02]
COOPER: And it pits -- you know, it's like the breakup of a conspiracy family. Who's going to go with mommy? Who's going to go with daddy?
O'SULLIVAN: 100 percent.
COOPER: Yes.
O'SULLIVAN: Yes. So just this, like, the whole idea of the Epstein list.
COOPER: It's so ridiculous.
O'SULLIVAN: Yes.
COOPER: Right.
O'SULLIVAN: I mean, last year, early in 2024, true -- court documents were released where there were names --
COOPER: Yes.
O'SULLIVAN: -- of associates of Jeffrey Epstein. Donald Trump was mentioned in that. Zero accusation of any wrongdoing whatsoever. Just that he knew him --
COOPER: For years, there had been fake flight logs of Jeffrey Epstein that grow in size and new names are added. O'SULLIVAN: Yes.
COOPER: Most of them are people who are viewed as critics of President Trump. My name popped up on there all of a sudden.
O'SULLIVAN: Yes.
COOPER: And I started getting, you know, threats from people saying I'm on the Jeffrey Epstein list. It's fascinating that Elon Musk went there today with this.
O'SULLIVAN: Yes. I mean, to your point, right, these -- so what has -- imagine what has sort of become of this list, the lore of the list, really, is that in one tidy list, there are all the bad people who went to Epstein's Island, did all the bad things, abused women, young women, and so forth.
And as you mentioned, for years, because it has been pushed in right- wing circles, which are normally pro-Trump circles, the list just so happens to be people who are critical of Trump or people who report on Trump or journalists like yourself who were there. And, you know, people take those lists seriously.
COOPER: Right.
O'SULLIVAN: There's a lot of people, as you know, you probably saw in your mentions and emails and everything else, people --
COOPER: Yes.
O'SULLIVAN: -- expressing disgust at you. So this, you know, for as much and as for as important and hugely important, of course, when it comes to government contracts, and the price of Tesla stock and all the fallout that is going to happen because of this feud that these two men are having, you know, Musk really went there. And that is perhaps why Trump chose to respond.
COOPER: What's interesting, though, is that, you know, Pam Bondi and others who have peddled or, you know, people who have had podcasts who have peddled these conspiracy theories who are now running, you know, the FBI or running, you know, have high up positions, they are in a position where they've actually seen, I guess, these files.
And, you know, they are the ones deciding what gets released and what's not. And they are now victims of their own conspiracy theories, because there's no they're there. And they're disappointing the conspiracy minded people who haven't seen what --
O'SULLIVAN: It's good -- I mean, there -- you -- there's a clip I saw of Alex Jones tonight that noted conspiracy theorists who is trying to wrap his head -- like, because these guys are normally so used of having good guy, bad guy. Normally, the bad guys, a Democrat or somebody who doesn't like Trump.
And now they are really trying to say, OK, well, what does the conspiracy theorists do when another conspiracy theorist blows up a conspiracy theory --
COOPER: Yes.
O'SULLIVAN: -- about a conspiracy theorist?
COOPER: Donie O'Sullivan, thanks very much.
O'SULLIVAN: Thanks.
COOPER: Coming up next, more breaking news, Ukraine coming under Russian missile fire in the wake of its strike on targets deep inside Russia. Report ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:42:36]
COOPER: More breaking news tonight. Ukraine's capital Kyiv coming under fire from Russian ballistic missiles and drones, that's according to the Ukrainian Air Force. We've been trying to get images to show you. We don't have them yet.
I want to go to CNN's Nick Paton Walsh. What more do we know about this assault?
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Anderson. It is hard to tell at this stage whether or not this is essentially the retaliation, which Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared to have telephoned Donald Trump to warn him was likely coming. And Trump described as what would be a response that was, quote, "very strong".
What we know at this point that there are seemingly multiple waves of ballistic missiles that have been launched at Kharkiv region. That's to the northeast at the capital Kyiv itself and also Sumy region in the north. It's been under heavy Russian land assaults over the past week or so.
Drones appear to be in the air over Kyiv at the moment as well. Well, I should stress and a lot of this happens nightly. And so it's really a bit really. I think Ukrainians have to wake up tomorrow and assess the full scope of the damage to know quite whether or not this is the attack that Russia will consider to be its retaliation for what happened on the airfields over the weekend.
And I should stress, too, during that weekend itself, Russia launched a record 450 or so drones towards Ukraine, many of which were intercepted. So these nightly barrages Ukrainians live with frequently. I think there's been significant nervousness, though, today because of that Trump-Putin call and other indications in the capital that something significant might be underway.
We're hearing of Tupolev 95 long range bombers, the same propeller driven craft that were targeted in the drone attack over the weekend in the air. Caliber ballistic missiles, too, was well being launched from the south. So reports of three injured so far and indication that something significant underway.
But as I say, Anderson, until we actually see the full scope of it, when it comes to an end, possibly in the dawn hours, Ukrainians won't get to judge if this was the response Moscow pledged after the attacks on the airfields --
COOPER: Yes.
PATON WALSH: -- or is again another horrific nightly barrage. Anderson?
COOPER: And hey, Nick, how able is Ukraine to try to counter ballistic missiles?
PATON WALSH: Yes, I mean, the desperate thing they need here are Patriot interceptors. They're the most effective means of attacking or taking down these ballistic missiles that may well tonight be coming in such volume that they're designed to overwhelm Ukraine's air defenses. But Ukraine has been public for months now about how scant the interceptors for patriots it has still left in its stocks, pleading for more.
[20:45:07]
And that's something I think they're most concerned that the disruption in their relationship with the United States will be first impacted by. Anderson?
COOPER: Yes. Nick Paton Walsh reporting. Thanks very much, Nick.
We'll try to gather as much information. We do expect images to start coming in. Obviously, we'll continue to show you those throughout the night tonight here on CNN.
Coming up next, my conversation with George Clooney on legendary anchor Edward R. Murrow, who he's portraying in "Good Night, and Good Luck" ahead of its broadcast this weekend on CNN.
(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)
GEORGE CLOONEY, ACTOR: He gambled his reputation on telling the truth, and he won in terms of telling the truth and had great success in it. But it did cost him.
(END VIDEOCLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:50:28]
COOPER: Saturday, for the first time ever, we're going to be broadcasting a Broadway play live. "Good Night, and Good Luck" is the play starring and co-written by George Clooney. He plays legendary newsman Edward R. Murrow, and it's about Murrow standing up to Senator Joseph McCarthy. Earlier this week, I met up with Clooney on the set of the play, which is designed to look like CBS's newsroom and studio in the time of Murrow. Here's some of that conversation.
(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)
COOPER: You stand on the stage every night in front of all these seats. And I'm wondering, what do you -- what did the people here tell you about this play? Like, what is the feeling they have that brings them here?
CLOONEY: The things that I get to say, which were Edward R. Murrow's words. You know, Edward R. Murrow represented us at our best. He spoke in a way that we all wish we could in the right moments. You know, I'm always in the car driving home going, you know what I should have said. And he kind of said it exactly the right way at the right time.
And you can feel everybody move forward in their chairs. You can know by the end, this whole front row is just weeping. They're just bawling. I think they feel that they wanted a place to be in a room together where they could hear and talk about who we are at our best.
COOPER: You've had people -- I mean, I'm sure we've had break out protests in the audience.
CLOONEY: Sure. Sure. A couple and for both sides. We've had them yell, resist and stand up and scream. And we've had them stand up and yell on the other side. That's OK. You know --
COOPER: Do you change anything? I mean, do you respond to that?
CLOONEY: I have responded at times, but only in character. Only --
COOPER: You respond as Edward R. Murrow.
CLOONEY: Sure. Just say, well, you know, as a reporter, I've covered protests. I believe in -- I believe our nation was founded on protests and in the great traditions of the First Amendment and the Constitution. I hope you feel satisfied with your protests. And now you'll sit down and let everybody else --
COOPER: Does that work?
CLOONEY: It does, I think. Kind of. I think people wanted to get there -- I think they want to make their point. And I think that at times, particularly when it's against what we're trying to say, it's hard to really argue against speaking truth to power because it cuts both ways. You know --
COOPER: The left and right.
CLOONEY: That's what I mean.
COOPER: Both want to speak truth to power.
CLOONEY: And both of the powers don't really want to be challenged -- COOPER: Right.
CLOONEY: -- all that often. You know, I mean, I've been friends with many presidents who don't love getting, you know, called constantly on the carpet. And so it cuts both ways. Speaking truth to power.
COOPER: It does -- to the times we're in, though, I mean, is -- what happened tomorrow, though, a cautionary tale?
CLOONEY: You know, he gambled his reputation on telling the truth and he won in terms of telling the truth and had great success in it. But it did cost him.
COOPER: What do you think Murrow would think about what's happening at CBS News today?
CLOONEY: Well, I think it's an interesting question. You know, Bill Owen was here a couple of days --
COOPER: Before executive producer of CBS who resigned.
CLOONEY: Who resigned. He was here a couple of days before he resigned. I said to him, remember, a lot of the men, the characters in this play are the people who started 60 Minutes. And they lost their job doing this or they were they was greatly reduced.
But they -- but it stands the test of time. And remember that losing your job is not the worst thing that can happen. The worst thing that happened is that you let a moment in time and in history go without challenging it. A moment that needed to be challenged.
What a -- you know, I have friends who were on Nixon's enemies list. And I say to him, you know, because, you know, Donald Trump tweets about everybody all the time. You know, stuff. And I said, how did that how did that make you feel? And they always say that they're so proud. They would be so ashamed if they weren't on that list.
You have to -- I want to be able to look at our kids and say there was a moment in time when this was happening. And this is where I stood. Whether it worked or not, whether it was effective or not, at the very least, there was -- it wasn't out of cowardice. I wasn't -- I didn't shirk my responsibilities as a citizen of the United States.
COOPER: Early on my career, I spent a lot of time going to societies that were falling apart. I was very interested in what happens when societies fall apart and collapse. What has surprised you the most in the last or since this administration took power in this term about the Dominoes that have fallen?
CLOONEY: Well, it's been --
[20:55:05]
COOPER: We've seen, you know, billionaires going to the inauguration --
CLOONEY: Yes.
COOPER: -- you know, when Netflix deal for Melania Trump for $40 million --
CLOONEY: $40 million.
COOPER: -- for a documentary is --
CLOONEY: It's a lot of money for a documentary.
COOPER: Yes.
CLOONEY: I'm anxious to see the documentary, though. I mean, the damage that's happening to places like USAID is, you know, it's remarkable and it's damage. It's going to be very hard to fix. I am surprised at how effective it's been against the universities, against the law firms in that -- in the willingness to burn it all down.
COOPER: These are levers of power that have never been pulled before. Going after law firms is a new concept. Going after universities like this. You look at the pillars of democracy, the checks and balances. How do you think the legislative branch, the judicial branch and the fourth estate journalists are holding up onto this?
CLOONEY: Well, sometimes good and sometimes not, right? The legislative branch right now is not doing a very good job obviously. Judicial branch has done some pretty remarkable things.
COOPER: Elon Musk today said it's a disgusting abomination of a spending bill. Are you surprised that --
CLOONEY: Well, you're about to see some very --
COOPER: -- that's turned?
CLOONEY: This is going to be -- I mean, anyone who saw that from the beginning and didn't think it was going to get much, much worse later is, you know --
COOPER: Kara Swisher put a clock on it. I forgot how many days she said it would be, but it's --
CLOONEY: You'd be -- if you didn't think that was going to happen, then you've been taking some of the pills out of Elon Musk's pillbox because this was always going to have some problems. And, you know, and I don't think Donald Trump like sharing the spotlight. And I don't think Elon Musk, you know, like not having the power.
So I don't know. We'll see. We'll see where both --
COOPER: Do you think Trumpism last beyond this term.
CLOONEY: Don't think so. I think I think it'd be very hard to do it. Remember this, Donald Trump is a celebrity. That's what he is. I mean, he's got a -- you know, he has a star on Hollywood Boulevard. I don't have a star on Hollywood Boulevard. I'm not lobbying for one. I'm just saying, you know --
COOPER: It seems like an oversight, by the way.
CLOONEY: What's going on? He's a celebrity and he's the president, the United States. And so he has been elected, duly elected. Fair deal. I'm not complaining about that. That's how it works. That's how this democracy works.
But he's also a celebrity and he is charming. And to the people who like him, they think he's funny. To a great many others, they don't. There's nobody else like that.
COOPER: He has a unique set of skills.
CLOONEY: He is his own entity. And so when he is finished and he will be finished, they're going to have to go looking for someone who can deliver the message that he delivered with the same kind of charisma. And they don't have that.
COOPER: If you look at polling on Democrats, I mean, they're not doing well.
CLOONEY: No, but that's now and they shouldn't do well.
COOPER: Do you think the Democratic Party is lost right now?
CLOONEY: No, this is the -- this is what happens when you get beaten, right? You get, you lose and everybody points fingers and they point fingers at each other and themselves and the press and everybody else. And fair enough. That's what happens.
And all you need is one -- I mean, you remember how in the weeds the Democratic Party was during the George Bush Jr. years and then Barack Obama comes up and all of a sudden everybody's joined together. And it's a, you know, it heals very quickly.
Right now, there's some naval gazing. Fair enough. There should be. There were some dumb mistakes made.
COOPER: This is a replica of the CBS News --
CLOONEY: Exactly.
COOPER: -- which was, by the way, I just learned --
CLOONEY: Grand Central.
COOPER: -- from Scott Pelley (ph), this was in Grand Subway Station.
CLOONEY: Yes. Yes. So we put the big window up in there. Yes, it was massive ceilings in there. And then they would do some recordings of music. That's why we put the band in there.
My aunt Rosemary used to sing over at CBS a lot. And then these -- all these things have these slits down on the ground here. And they -- and the desks sort of slide in and out. The lights come up and down. And so the sets move around a lot.
COOPER: How much of this is a tribute to your dad?
CLOONEY: A lot of it. You know, I mean, you know, when we wrote the movie in 2004 and '05, it's funny. You know, originally we did this as a live television show. It's going to be a live TV show. And then there was the incident with Justin Timberlake and --
COOPER: Janet Jackson?
CLOONEY: -- Janet Jackson and the nudity situation. And we got a call. We were in pre-production.
COOPER: You got bumped by --
CLOONEY: We got bumped by --
COOPER: -- the exposed.
CLOONEY: -- those exposed breasts. And so we turned around and took out the commercials and wrote it as a movie. But, you know, my dad -- when I was a kid, my dad would stand up on a chair like this and he would do the speech that I start and close the show with the box of lights and wires.
COOPER: He would do the Edward R. Murrow speech?
CLOONEY: He would do the Edward R. Murrow speech. So this is a big -- and my father was an anchorman for 40 years. And it's a big salute to my dad and the things that he stands for and believes in and fights for.
(END VIDEOCLIP)
COOPER: We'll have more of my conversation with George Clooney tomorrow night. This weekend, CNN will air a special live broadcast, "Good Night, and Good Luck". You can catch the Tony nominated play Saturday night, 7:00 p.m. Eastern and streaming on CNN.com.
That's it for us. The news continues. The Source with Kaitlan Collins starts now.
