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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Trump: Severe Consequences if Putin Doesn't Agree to End War; Summit with Putin Setting the Table for Possible Second Meeting to Include Zelenskyy; Godfather of A.I. Reveals His Vision for How Humanity can Survive Super Intelligent Artificial Intelligence; Godfather of A.I. Suggests Building Maternal Instincts Into A.I. Models Could Mitigate Risks; Trump to Seek Extended Takeover of D.C. Police Beyond 30-day Limit; National Guard Ramping Up 24/7 Presence on D.C. Streets; Potential Cure for Baldness and Thinning Hair is on the Horizon, a New Drug PP-405 is in the Early Stages of Research. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired August 13, 2025 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ELIZABETH WAGMEISTER, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT: ... Sabrina Carpenter who is one of the biggest Gen Z musicians out there, and this is going to be a pop album. So we have heard country music from Taylor, we've heard more somber, angsty music, and now she's getting back to her pop roots.
And look, Kate, for anyone who may not care so much about this, this is one of the most important couples in the world, biggest football player, biggest star in the world, so huge cultural force right here.
KATE BOLDUAN, CNN HOST: Huge cultural force, and they're still talking so there's much more to come.
Elizabeth, thank you very much, I really appreciate that. Thanks for joining us everyone I'm, Kate Bolduan, AC360 starts now.
[20:00:37]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "ANDERSON COOPER: 360": Tonight on 360, will the President let Vladimir Putin have pieces of Ukraine when they meet on Friday? He told European leaders he won't. We'll talk to his former National Security advisor, Ambassador John Bolton, on whether he thinks his old boss will stand firm.
Also tonight, the Nobel prize winner, known as the godfather of A.I., who thinks there's a 10 to 20 percent chance it'll wipe out humans, proposes a possible solution. Program A.I. with motherly instincts. He joins me tonight to explain and Kara Swisher to react.
Plus, a cure for baldness and thinning hair would be a multi-billion dollar business have researchers studying skin cancer and might have stumbled upon a possible solution.
Good evening, thanks for joining us. We begin tonight with the question that could decide the immediate fate of Ukraine and the future of Europe, and the NATO alliance, namely, which Donald Trump will show up at the summit with Vladimir Putin in Anchorage, Alaska, less than two days from now.
Will it be the one who spoke today with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders telling them, sources say, that he would not negotiate Ukrainian territory with Vladimir Putin? Or will the Donald Trump, who shows up Friday be the one who just two days ago said he might be okay with the idea of Ukraine having to give up some of its territory for peace?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: There will be some land swapping going on. I know that through Russia and through conversations with everybody to the good, for the good of Ukraine. Good stuff, not bad stuff. Also, some bad stuff for both.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: He didn't specify who would be negotiating that land swapping, as he called it. He also did not acknowledge that the land in question was taken by a foreign aggressor. He did, however, add the "We're going to see what the parameters are, and then I'm going to call up President Zelenskyy and European leaders.
Today, the President warned yet again, a potential severe consequences for Russia.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Will Russia face any consequences if Vladimir Putin does not agree to stop the war after your meeting on Friday?
TRUMP: Yes they will.
REPORTER: What will the consequences -- sanctions, tariffs?
TRUMP: There will be consequences. There will be. I don't have to say there will be very severe consequences.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: The President also said that if all goes well in the summit, he'd like to immediately arrange a follow up.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: And we'll have a quick second meeting between President Putin and President Zelenskyy and myself, if they'd like to have me there.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: The President said Friday's summit would be setting the table for this second meeting. His Press Secretary calls it a listening exercise for him, and The White House has been downplaying expectations for the last several days.
For Russia's part, a Kremlin foreign ministry spokesman says Moscow's position is unchanged. It's not dropping any territorial claims on Eastern Ukraine, and a close Putin aide says that a second meeting following Alaska is expected to take place on Russian soil.
I want to go to CNN chief White House correspondent and anchor of "The Source," Kaitlan Collins. So what else did the President have to say about this summit?
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think, Anderson, really the question are what the Presidents expectations are or strategy is going into this summit. And today, one thing he made clear about a potential trilateral summit that would happen with Putin, Trump and Zelenskyy coming after this. He said he would like for it to happen quickly. But he also made clear, Anderson, that he believes its conditioned on what he hears from the Russian leader on Friday and warning about the severe consequences if Putin doesn't come to Alaska preparing to end this war in Ukraine.
Obviously, there's been no indication from Putin that he's prepared to do that. We've seen him continuing to strike in Ukraine, and two things that the President was asked about today stood out and kind of seemed to foreshadow what we should expect to see potentially on Friday, which is one, he was asked if he can convince Putin to stop killing Ukrainian civilians. And he noted that he has tried to get that to happen before. They've had conversations about this. And then after those conversations between Trump and Putin ended, Russia continued striking Ukraine. And so, the President seemed to suggest that he could not convince him to do that.
And then on the other front, he was also asked about that new "New York Times" reporting about Russia breaching federal court systems here in the United States with highly sensitive National Security info involved in that, and whether or not he could confront Putin over it. He basically responded, Anderson, reminiscent of the way that he has previously on Russia interfering in U.S. elections, saying, you know, yes, Russia hacks, the United States does it, too, and the United States is better at it.
And so, I don't know, there are a lot of key questions going into to what Friday is going to look like and what the takeaways for President Trump are going to be.
COOPER: Do we know what it's going to look like, actually? I mean, physically, I mean, we know the base now, as you know, we learned last night where it's going to take place, how long it's going to be?
COLLINS: It's at Elmendorf, yes. I think one thing that the White House is looking at from officials, I've spoken to some of them who are around the last time Trump met with Putin in Helsinki is always expected to go longer than its scheduled for. We'll see the schedule probably come out likely tomorrow.
Trump will leave Washington on Friday. Obviously, meetings that happen between the two of them, typically go much longer with the Russian leader. Obviously, he talks a lot and there are translators also in the room for part of that. The White House did confirm to me there will be a one on one portion with Trump and Putin in the room, likely translator as well as we've seen before. Then it will open up to where you'll see more aides inside the room, people like the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, and other top National Security aides.
[20:05:45]
And so, I think the question is, when they come out of that, one thing we don't know yet is, will it be a joint press conference like we saw in Helsinki? Obviously, we were both there covering that or, you know, as in when Geneva -- when President Biden, when President Putin, they held separate press conferences following that meeting.
And so, a real question of what the format there looks like and what we hear from them, because those are often the most candid moments when we really find out what happened inside that room and what went on, and whether the President thinks that this is going to be momentum forward to doing what he's trying to do, which is bring the war in Ukraine to an end.
COOPER: Kaitlan Collins, thanks very much. We'll see you at the top of the hour for "The Source."
Joining me right now is Ambassador John Bolton. He was the National Security advisor during the first Trump administration, was in the room for the first summit between the President and Vladimir Putin in Helsinki in 2018. That we were just talking about. He also served in the U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. under President George W. Bush.
Ambassador, do you believe President Trump is going to heed the appeal of Zelenskyy and European leaders and not negotiate control of Ukrainian territory and not make a unilateral ceasefire deal with Putin?
JOHN BOLTON, FORMER TRUMP NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Well, I think this virtual summit they had today is sort of like a short term vaccination. He probably came out of it thinking in those terms, but it will depend on how the meeting goes with Putin. I think Putin has the initiative here, and I think his -- what he's going to try and do is show to Trump that he has a peace plan and that its sincere, even though I don't think it will be, but he's going to try and convince Trump and try and bring him back on his side.
I think it's going to be a difficult task with Putin because I think intentionally or unintentionally, he did irritate Trump, to put it mildly. But he's going to try to work his KGB training to bring him back and I think that could involve negotiation. You know, there's a diplomatic term to say, well, we're not really negotiating, we're having an exchange of views. And so, they'll exchange views on things like territory and issues like that and it could get pretty specific.
COOPER: President Trump threatened Russia with severe consequences if there's not movement toward a peace deal. Do you buy that?
BOLTON: Well, he has threatened before, obviously, tariffs on Russia, which I think the Russians think is hollow given the low amount of exports annually to the U.S. But secondary tariffs on countries primarily buying oil and gas from Russia, they have slapped the 25 percent tariff on India, although it hasn't gone into effect yet. I can tell you the reaction in India to that, particularly with no tariffs slapped on China, which bought an awful lot more oil and gas from Russia, is the Indians are incandescent about this.
And there's talk of Putin coming to India later this year. There's talk of Prime Minister Modi of India going to China for the first time since 2018. Obviously, both Moscow and Beijing are going to try to bring India closer to them. I mean, this could have negative consequences because it wasn't well thought through.
COOPER: What -- I mean, just from your experience, seeing these two leaders in the same place back in Helsinki, what did you take away from that? What did you learn?
BOLTON: Well, in the one-on-one they had in Helsinki, not very much came out of it, which I thought was a good thing. Putin did a lot of talking about Syria, they exchanged a few things. Trump did make the point. As Putin admitted in the subsequent press conference, that the U.S. position was that the annexation of Crimea that had been carried out by Russia in 2014, was illicit. So, Trump can make the points if he wants to.
But I think what Putin -- part of what Putin's going to try and do here is make this a bigger discussion than Ukraine. I think he's going to talk about potential for U.S. investment in rare earths in Russia, oil investments to get on Trump's wavelengths, about bigger economic opportunities, he may. There's been speculation that Putin may come and say, you know, we need a better bilateral relationship here. And one of the key things is that the New Start Nuclear Weapons Treaty expires in 2026. Let's agree today to start negotiations immediately on a successor treaty. I think Trump would jump at that.
So, you know, you have to watch what the bounds of the playing field are going to be. And I think Putin has his effort to show that he and Donald are good friends again, is going to try and make it as broad as possible.
[20:10:14]
COOPER: CNN is reporting that small groups of Russian troops have pierced parts of Ukraine's defenses in the Eastern part of the Country, Russia appears to be making a late push to try to get as much territory as possible before the summit. Do you think that is linked to kind of, you know, making a statement before they meet?
BOLTON: Yes, I mean, I think it's clearly an effort to shape the battlefield and have that affect the summit. Honestly, the Russians have been so incompetent in three-and-a-half years of this war, even if they've made a breakthrough, they don't apparently teach their officers how to do maneuver warfare. This could be a significant advance, but based on three-and-a-half years of experience with Russian incompetence, I wouldn't put a lot into it.
COOPER: President Trump also said that he thinks this summit could be followed, what he said was almost immediately by a meeting with Putin and Zelenskyy. Do you think that's likely? BOLTON: I don't think it's likely. Look, I don't think on actual substance, the Ukrainian and Russian positions are anywhere close. And in fact, I think that feeds into one of Putin's alternative strategies, which is this European insistence that before there are any negotiations, there has to be a ceasefire.
I think this is a trap for Ukraine, assuming and it's a big assumption that the Europeans can continue to supply all the military assistance that Ukraine needs, I would say they should try and have negotiations without a ceasefire, without fixing the front lines as a new line of demarcation, and particularly not put a peacekeeping force in place, because I think if they try that, you sit down for negotiations after a ceasefire, that ceasefire line becomes the new Russian-Ukrainian border and 20 percent of Ukraine is going to be behind that ceasefire line. That's not a good look for Ukraine.
COOPER: Yes, Ambassador John Bolton, thank you.
Coming up now, the latest calls for transparency in the Jeffrey Epstein case. Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee have sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi and the Director of the FBI, or, excuse me, the Federal Bureau of Prisons, William Marshall, seeking the release of information related to the Epstein accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell's interview with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, as well as Maxwell's recent transfer to that minimum security prison camp in Texas.
Now, House Democrats write that the Department of Justice's actions in the Epstein case, "raised substantial concerns that the administration may now be attempting to tamper with a crucial witness, conceal President Trump's relationship with convicted sex offenders, and coax Miss Maxwell into providing false or misleading testimony in order to protect the President."
The letter goes on to note that Maxwell's recent transfer appears to violate both the DOJ and the Bureau of Prisons policies. I am joined now by someone who sits on that committee, Democratic Congressman of New York and former federal prosecutor Dan Goldman.
Congressman, so what specific materials do you want the Department of Justice to turn over?
REP. DAN GOLDMAN (D-NY): Well, we're looking for first and foremost the Ghislaine Maxwell recorded video of the interviews, as well as the transcript. But also we want to understand exactly what process was undertaken to transfer her from a medium security prison in Florida, where she was serving her 20-year sentence to a camp, a very, very low security facility in Texas that a sex offender like Ghislaine Maxwell would otherwise not be permitted to be transferred to.
This is a huge, huge windfall for Ghislaine Maxwell and the question is, what did she say? What did she promise in order to get this great benefit that she would otherwise not deserve?
This whole thing has been an absolute travesty for the Department of Justice. They are destroying it, they are really destroying the credibility of the Department of Justice by using it and they're using it as Donald Trump's personal lawyer, his arm of his political operation with his former defense lawyers at the helm.
COOPER: So, if she would not -- she would have had a special designation making her ineligible to serve a prison sentence in a minimum security prison, would -- I mean, is there anything like a waiver or anything that would allow that?
GOLDMAN: There is a waiver process. It usually takes months, several layers of review, and someone like Ghislaine Maxwell who showed no remorse as part of her sentencing in her trial, who also was convicted of perjury, would not ordinarily be eligible for such a waiver. She would not qualify for any special favors, other than the fact that she met with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, which in and of itself is outrageous and very, very unusual.
And now, gets a sweetheart move to a nice camp where she's able potentially even to leave on work release, which is exactly the same as Jeffrey Epstein's first sweetheart plea deal from Alex Acosta.
[20:15:28]
COOPER: Well, let me let me ask you about Alex Acosta, who was then the former U.S. Attorney in South Florida. He made that that so-called sweetheart deal with Epstein. Florida GOP Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna has said that calling Acosta to testify is not off the table. What reason is there for him not to be in the group of initial subpoenas that have already gone out?
GOLDMAN: None. The only reason is, she's connected to Donald Trump.
COOPER: He would seem to know everything -- he would seem to know all the details.
GOLDMAN: He knows the most.
COOPER: Right.
GOLDMAN: He knows the most because he actually fashioned the plea deal with Jeffrey Epstein's attorneys without the line prosecutors in the room. He went around them and above them and above them, which is very similar to what Todd Blanche is doing. Todd Blanche sat for an interview with Ghislaine Maxwell for two days. The guy runs 115,000 employee department and he spent two days with Ghislaine Maxwell, without the prosecutors who charged and tried the case.
So, he has no idea what the evidence is. He can't measure whether its credible or not. This is all a charade. It is a complete bogus charade designed to cover up for Donald Trump. Cover up for what? We don't know that's in the Epstein files.
COOPER: If the President wanted to rule out clemency for Miss Maxwell, he could just rule out clemency for her, couldn't he?
GOLDMAN: What do you mean? He could say that he won't give her clemency. Do you believe anything Donald Trump says? COOPER: Yes.
GOLDMAN: He can say anything he wants to say but I wouldn't, you know, to walk down the block.
COOPER: But he's not even doing that. I mean, do you believe that there is some sort of a deal here?
GOLDMAN: I believe that there is a wink and a nod, and that all parties understand what the goal is here. And the goal is to distract from the Epstein files, to create a shiny new object who has nothing to lose other than a pardon and clemency. She has every incentive to testify favorably for Donald Trump because he holds all the keys to her freedom. And this is someone who has been convicted of perjury. So, there's a clear understanding as to what she needs to do and what the possible rewards are. And this transfer is just an indication of the power that Donald Trump and Todd Blanche have to be able to reward her favorable testimony.
COOPER: Congressman Goldman, I appreciate your time. Thank you.
GOLDMAN: Thanks, Anderson.
COOPER: Coming up next, Nobel laureate computer scientist, Geoffrey Hinton, making headlines today with his suggestion that to avoid humanity being wiped out by A.I., its developers need to give super intelligent A.I. motherly instincts so they'll care about us human beings. I'll talk to him, coming up.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEOFFREY HINTON, GODFATHER OF A.I.: We have to make it so that when they're more powerful than us and smarter than us, they still care about us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Also tonight, the latest on the growing military presence on the streets of Washington and the President leaving open the possibility of declaring a National Emergency.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:23:01]
COOPER: A stark warning about artificial intelligence from Geoffrey Hinton, the Nobel prize winning scientist whose pioneering research helped lay the groundwork for A.I. that's why he's often called the "Godfather of A.I.".
Hinton says there's a 10 to 20 percent chance A.I. will wipe out humans, but made headlines today suggesting at a conference that the tech industry should somehow install what he termed maternal instincts into super intelligent A.I. So, they'll protect humans like mothers protect their babies.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HINTON: They've been saying we have to stay in control of these A.I.s. We've somehow got to be stronger than them. We've got to be dominant, and they've got to be submissive. That's not going to work. We have to make it so that when they're more powerful than us and smarter than us, they still care about us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Geoffrey Hinton joins me now. Professor Hinton, your remarks have obviously gotten a lot of attention. You talked about engineers building maternal instincts into A.I. models. What would be the purpose of that? What would that do? And is it even possible?
HINTON: Most of the A.I. experts believe that sometime in the next five to 20 years will make A.I.s that are smarter than people, and they'll probably end up much smarter than people. And there's very few examples we know of smarter things being controlled by less smart things.
In fact, pretty much the only example we know is a mother being controlled by her baby. To make that happen, evolution built maternal instincts into the mother. And if we don't do something like that with these alien beings that were creating, we're going to be history.
COOPER: How hard is it from -- I mean, just a technological perspective to actually build motherly instincts? I mean, is it -- is there an example of that being done at all or has that happened at all?
HINTON: The only real example we have is evolution. Evolution obviously made a pretty good job of it with mothers. People haven't been focusing on that. They've been focusing on making these things more intelligent. But intelligence is just one part of a being. We need to make them have empathy towards us. And we don't know how to do that yet. But evolution managed it and we should be able to do it too.
[20:25:12]
COOPER: You know, we've heard from so many people, leaders in the tech field who say, well, look, if the U.S. doesn't win this war, this battle for dominance in the A.I. world, you know, a rogue nation, a country that's an enemy of the United States, China, Russia, they're going to have A.I.
If China is not developing A.I. that has maternal instincts, and the U.S. is the only one who has maternal instincts, does that not make them -- I mean, is that not making them weaker in this war against for dominance?
HINTON: Well, there are many risks of A.I. like cyberattacks and loss of jobs and making nasty viruses. But one of the risks is this existential threat that A.I. will take over. And for that threat, all the countries will collaborate because they're all in the same boat. No country wants A.I. to take over. Just as the USSR and the Americans collaborated at the height of the Cold War, countries will collaborate on how to prevent A.I. from taking over from people.
COOPER: Do you -- I mean, do you believe human nature won't encourage some leader somewhere to or some government somewhere to believe that they can control it, whether or not that's actually possible?
HINTON: Well, we have a nice example in the states of a government that's determined to control it. I don't think that's going to work. It may work against other countries. But when A.I. becomes smarter than people, that's just not going to work. This whole idea that people need to be dominant and the A.I. needs to be submissive, that's the kind of bros idea that I don't think will work when they're much smarter than us.
COOPER: Do you do you really believe -- do you still believe that 10 to 20 percent chance of A.I.s wiping out humans is possible?
HINTON: Oh yes, if we don't -- if we can't figure out a solution to how we can still be around when they're much smarter than us and much more powerful than us, we'll be toast.
COOPER: What do you think? I mean, it's stunning to me that this technology, I mean, it's already changing things, but the tidal wave of change that we are going to be seeing shortly and are already seeing that its being run by people who are not elected. These are people, you know, who are making billions of dollars doing this. Nobody ever really elected them. There's been no consensus agreement that, yes, this is good for humanity. Do you think the average person and I include myself in that grouping, understands what is about to happen here?
HINTON: No, I think they don't. And I think it's important for the public to understand it. We need a counter pressure to the tech bros who are saying there should be no regulations on A.I. And also, we need the countries to understand they need to collaborate on how to avoid the existential threat.
COOPER: Does -- what do you think it does to initiative for you know, I have a three-year-old and a five-year-old. I'm very worried about, you know, what world they're going to have in ten years if there's machines that do everything better than humans do, what's the initiative for people to strive to become good at something?
HINTON: One thing we know about mothers is -- mothers genuinely care about their babies, and they do whatever they can to make life interesting for the babies and to make the babies grow and realize their full potential. So, if we have super intelligent A.I. looking after us, we may be able to get the same thing.
COOPER: Geoffrey Hinton, it's a real pleasure to talk to you. Thank you.
HINTON: Thank you. COOPER: Well, a lot more on this next, I'll talk to tech journalist and long-time industry watcher, Kara Swisher. Get her take on Hinton's idea.
Plus, with the White House saying the National Guard presence in Washington will be growing, the President is not ruling out declaring a National Emergency. What could happen in a month when authorization for the President's actions run out less than 30 days from now?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:33:38]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST OF "ANDERSON COOPER 360": Just before the break, I spoke with Geoffrey Hinton, the often called the Godfather of A.I., about his fears that technology could potentially wipe out humanity and his suggestion that somehow installing maternal instincts in Generative A.I. could be the solution. My next guest has spoken extensively about A.I. for a very long time, its impact and how tech industry leaders are navigating it. Joining me now CNN's contributor, Kara Swisher, who also is a podcast host and author of "Burn Book: A Tech Love Story." What do you think of this idea of maternal instincts?
KARA SWISHER, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: OK, fair.
(LAUGH)
COOPER: Sure.
SWISHER: Because tech people are really maternal. That's how I think of Mark Zuckerberg and all the others.
(LAUGH)
SWISHER: You know, it's an idea.
COOPER: Well, he did have a school, I just read.
SWISHER: Let's not get into that right now.
(LAUGH)
COOPER: OK.
SWISHER: Let's not get into that.
COOPER: OK.
SWISHER: But no, I don't think -- I think it's really hard to the idea of what is a maternal instinct --
COOPER: Right.
SWISHER: -- by the way.
COOPER: Yeah.
SWISHER: How do you define it?
COOPER: And do you instill that in Gen A.I.?
SWISHER: Right. And why would people that are in a for-profit corporation even think that's important, which they don't. The problem is that our government is not involved in a way that is important. And before government has been a -- has been a check on corporate interests, whether it's railroads or everything.
COOPER: It is amazing to me that this tsunami of change is breaking and coming, and coming ashore. And I mean, I don't think we're --
SWISHER: We're not paying attention.
COOPER: We are not prepared. Yeah.
SWISHER: (expletive) China, that's their excuse.
COOPER: Right. Yes. That is always the argument.
SWISHER: Yes.
COOPER: Oh look, China's on -- breathing down our neck.
[20:35:00]
SWISHER: I call it the Xi or me argument. And I wish --
(LAUGH)
SWISHER: I wish I had another choice. That's all I have to say. I mean, we can try all we want, but the -- it's in the hands of private corporations that want to make money. Most of it is, and the power is in those hands.
COOPER: I mean, they're not wrong about that argument of like, if enemy nations or more aggressive nations or --
SWISHER: Sure. But then it's -- it should be in the public interest and the public should have a say in it and especially, since the public paid for the internet that they make their billion dollar fortunes on. And so the question is, who controls this? Who gets to decide? It's actually a global issue more than anything else. And many times, you can't just have it be the U.S., it has to be a global -- just like nuclear issues are, whether --
COOPER: Right, anything that can destroy the planet.
SWISHER: Correct. Cloning, anything at all. CRISPR, all that stuff should -- genetic engineering, it's a global issue we all have -- . COOPER: Is there any movement of -- I mean, there is no movement for that.
SWISHER: No. None.
COOPER: It is an arms race.
SWISHER: No. This is an unregulated industry completely.
COOPER: When Hinton says, 10 to 20 percent chance of humans being wiped out, do you --
SWISHER: I don't think anybody knows. Where did he get that number? I don't know. I mean, I think it's called a non-zero chance.
COOPER: I think Sam Altman has said like a 2 percent.
SWISHER: Yeah. It's a non-zero. They are like -- that's their favorite thing, which is like, how about zero? Zero would be good. Any technology has risk to humanity, doesn't it? I mean --
COOPER: Although, I mean, yeah, this seems --
SWISHER: But this is a technology that could evolve itself. I mean, many years ago, Elon Musk was the first person really to talk about the dangers to me at least. And one of -- he initially started off in that Terminator idea, the idea that the Terminator wants to kill us and put us all in prisons and use us as energy or the Matrix idea. He then shifted to the idea that it treats us like a house cat, which I thought was kind of interesting that it's, you know like, you like your cat, you feed your cat, oops. You forgot to feed your cat.
COOPER: One step toward a motherly instinct.
SWISHER: One step towards -- right. That's a kind of a motherly instinct. And then the last one is that it's like a -- it's building a highway and we're ants on that highway. And so, they -- when we build a highway, do we think of the ant holes there?
COOPER: Well, it's also -- we're built -- this is being built so that it's, I mean, I don't even know what the term agentic exactly means But it's A.I. talking to A.I.
SWISHER: Yes, exactly.
COOPER: It's A.I. weapon systems fighting A.I. weapon systems.
SWISHER: Agentic is one of the words. Right. Exactly. That could be that. And then there could be drone warfare. They could launch drones. They could do whatever it wanted. And you know, even if watching any of the movies, the sci-fi, you have all those scenarios where it sets it off itself because it's the logical thing to do. One of the people, not Geoff Hinton, said to me once, if they -- what if they -- you said A.I. solved world starvation, what would it do?
The first thing it would do was kill half the people because that solves the world starvation problem, right? That kind of thing. Or where are they? Kill them. But you have to put in prompts or like, OK, don't kill people. OK. What about crops, figuring out new and efficient ways to do crops. And so, it really matters the human element in everything. The humans have to guide it, as flawed as we are, we have our self-interest and they don't have our self-interest, the A.I.
COOPER: Do you think it is moving as fast as, I mean, I've seen some articles recently, just in the last couple days, indicating the --
SWISHER: Is it going to -- are they in the dolphin state? Are they in the --
COOPER: Yeah.
SWISHER: Have they moved from the bird to the dolphin state? That's what they do. I don't think they know. I think they're making it up as they go along. But where it is headed, just like any technology, is inevitable that it will evolve itself. And in this case, they actually don't know. They like pretend they do, but they're like, when I was often at these dinner parties early on, they were like, we don't know. You know that could -- I mean, I know it sounds crazy.
COOPER: Which is terrifying.
SWISHER: It is because they don't know what it's doing inside of itself.
COOPER: I mean, if it's mass unemployment --
SWISHER: Right.
COOPER: If it's within suddenly a three-year-period --
SWISHER: Right.
COOPER: 20 percent of white collar jobs are eliminated --
SWISHER: Right.
COOPER: Or 30 percent?
SWISHER: Are replaced.
COOPER: Yeah. With machines.
SWISHER: Right. Well, it's not machines. It's that the things we -- some of the things we do are easily replaceable. Just the way back in the day when we had farms.
COOPER: Right. But are new -- what are the new jobs being created? How do you retrain all these people?
SWISHER: That's the question. What are the --
COOPER: What happens to that 30 percent?
SWISHER: Maybe we could ask A.I. to figure that out. Or maybe we say, OK, we want to figure out a way to do it and use -- the intelligence could be huge. It could solve cancer and all kinds of things, but it could also create a situation where they don't create solutions. They just create more problems. And certainly, our legislators are not on board with any of this and are not being very aggressive. But you could say that about a plethora of issues with our legislators these days. They're held captive by corporations.
COOPER: Kara Swisher, thanks very much.
SWISHER: Thank you.
COOPER: Appreciate it, as always. Coming up next, more breaking news. The president says he'll seek to maintain control of the D.C. police force for longer than the 30 days his emergency order allows, as he again suggested it may be start of a broader plan. You'll hear the heated response from the Democrat's top leader in the Senate. And later, how scientists stumbled upon a new potential treatment for hair loss. We'll talk to a reporter, looking to what some early trials have shown.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:44:18]
COOPER: It's breaking news now, the White House says there will be a significantly higher National Guard presence on the streets of D.C. tonight as President Trump's takeover of the city's law enforcement ramps up. White House didn't specify how many troops will be out, but they did say that federal agents will now be on 24/7 patrol. President has authority to take control of D.C.'s law enforcement for up to 30 days. Anything past that timeline requires congressional approval, something the president suggests he can bypass.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you talking to Congress about extending it or do you believe 30 days is sufficient?
DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Well, if it's a national emergency, we can do it without Congress, but we expect to be to Congress -- before Congress very quickly. And again, we think the Democrats will not do anything to stop crime, but we think the Republicans will do it almost unanimously.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[20:45:00]
COOPER: For what it's worth, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer tonight indicated that Democrats will not support an extension.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
AARON PARNAS, HOST OF "THE PARNAS PERSPECTIVE" PODCAST: And if he went to Congress and said, you know what? There's this crime emergency. We need the National Guard out there longer. We need to take over Washington, D.C. Would you grant it?
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER, (D-NY) SENATE MINORITY LEADER: No (expletive) way.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Joining me now is former Federal Prosecutor, Jeff Toobin, and journalist Gretchen Carlson, Co-Founder of Lift Our Voices. Jeff, just -- I mean, from a legal standpoint to extend for past the 30 days, seems like he could do it.
JEFF TOOBIN, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: I don't think that's true for the -- there are two things here. One is taking over the police force. That I think he really is limited by 30 days without getting congressional approval. The other issue is the National Guard. And I think he has essentially unlimited power there and he can keep the National Guard there for as long as he wants. But I do think he needs some sort of congressional approval if he wants to continue to control the police force. And that's the issue that is likely to come before Congress.
COOPER: He certainly sees this as a win -- it's clear he sees this as a winning issue.
GRETCHEN CARLSON, JOURNALIST AND CO-FOUNDER, LIFT OUR VOICES: Yeah. I mean, I think it is a winning issue.
COOPER: Not only that it takes attention away from other stories.
CARLSON: That's right. But, on its face, when people look at this and they say, wow, 30 more police officers on the streets to help fight crime. And people in Kansas and Iowa and Nebraska and Minnesota who want to come visit D.C. with their kids, they think, oh, it's going to be safer now. And they might fear crime more than people who live in big cities. It does actually present a big problem for Democrats because if you come out against this, it looks like you're not up for fighting crime.
COOPER: Right.
CARLSON: Right? And so I say all that, at the same time saying that this could be a distraction from the Epstein story. Who knows if there's actually a real plan or strategy, to your point, past 30 days. Trump said, today I'll just keep -- I'll just keep doing it. And it's a slippery slope. I mean, this is a slippery slope. Is he going to go to other cities and do the same thing?
COOPER: Right. I understand the argument about the -- all the concerns about military in the streets of cities. The governor of New York, Kathy Hochul, she did send National Guard into the subways. She credits that with a drop in crime in the subways. There were other groups who say, well, look, the drop was already happening in New York City after COVID.
TOOBIN: Well, absolutely. And you know --
COOPER: So it's not unprecedented to have a governor do it. It's just obviously -- TOOBIN: Absolutely. And in every other place in the United States, it's the governor in charge of the National Guard. But because D.C. is not a state, it's the president who gets to call in the National Guard. And the question is, is this what the National Guard is for? And is this an indefinite commitment to do this kind of work? I do agree that politically, it's always better to be seen as tough on crime rather than weak on crime. But at the same time, you have to decide, do police forces -- do localities control police forces or does the president of the United States? I mean, that's -- that traditionally in this country, it's been a classic local function around the police.
COOPER: It's also, I mean, obviously this was very hastily done. There wasn't a lot of coordination. And these are not trained MP law enforcement members of the National Guard. I mean, maybe some of them are, but that it's not just units that are trained in policing. A lot of these folks are not trained to be on patrol on the streets of a major metropolis.
CARLSON: I've been thinking the exact same thing. When you see the video of them, they're sort of walking down the street. I mean, they don't look like SWAT teams or people who are in the homicide division or taking on gains or things like that. I mean, maybe we're wrong, maybe they are trained in all of that. But to your point, I don't think that this was well thought out. I'm not sure that this has been something strategically that Trump decided to do six months ago, a year ago. I think that this may have been for distraction purposes, but also because Trump lives in D.C. now and he wants it to be safe. Right? But I also think it's a slippery slope of what comes next.
TOOBIN: And police work is trained work.
COOPER: Right.
TOOBIN: You can't just become a police officer. And these National Guard troops, as skilled as they are at what they do, they are not police officers. And there is a risk of danger to themselves and danger to the community if they don't know what they're doing.
COOPER: It's also interesting, I mean, the president basically says that by declaring a national emergency, he can extend this without congressional approval.
TOOBIN: And I don't see how he can.
COOPER: I mean, a national -- he's used a lot of national emergency for a number of executive orders and actions since he's taken power.
TOOBIN: He has, and it's just part of his efforts to take power away from other branches of government. Usually it's been the legislature and the judiciary. Here, it's states and localities that he's taking power from. But it's the same idea that the president gets to control areas that traditionally and legally he hasn't been able to do.
[20:50:00] CARLSON: The right way to do this would be to go to Congress and get a crime bill, which he also talked about today. So if he really wants to clean up these big metropolitan areas, then he should go to Congress and he should ask to get a crime bill. And he has Republicans on his side to be able to do that. Bringing in the military is a whole different operation.
TOOBIN: And bringing a crime bill before Congress is good politics for him. If he can get all the Democrats voting against a crime bill, even if there are good substantive arguments against that bill, I think that's a win for President Trump.
COOPER: It -- isn't it good politics for him to try to have battles with Democratic mayors in various cities across the country eating up attention for months?
TOOBIN: Absolutely. I think the public is a little more sophisticated that they know a stunt when they see one. But if the issue is, are you for more cops on the street or more law enforcement on the street, or are you against it? That's a good winning argument.
CARLSON: And if it works, I mean, if this works, then he's really going to have a victory in front of him.
COOPER: Well, what's interesting is if crime stats are -- go on a downward slope, whether they're there or not, it could be. I mean, it's the same argument being made in New York City. He can claim credit when it's a trend.
TOOBIN: And this -- you know, it is important to say, and it's a good thing. We report a lot of bad news here. It's good that crime is down all over the country after COVID.
COOPER: As a subway rider in New York, I'm very happy.
(CROSSTALK)
TOOBIN: That's where we are.
COOPER: Jeff Toobin, Gretchen Carlson, thanks very much. Up next, what could be very literally a hair-raising development, a potential new drug in development, very early stages, that may put an end to baldness and thinning hair. I'll talk to the reporter digging into the research ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:56:20]
COOPER: So could it be? Is it actually possible that a cure for baldness and thinning hair is on the horizon? A potential new drug, currently in development, known as PP-405 maybe -- may be the answer that millions of people who suffer from hair loss could be waiting for. According to a new article in New York Magazine, medication may not only slow down hair loss, may also revive hair follicles that have stopped growing. Lane Brown wrote the article. It's fascinating. He joins me now. So, this -- how did you learn about this? What is this drug and where in trials is it?
LANE BROWN, FEATURE WRITER, NEW YORK MAGAZINE: So right now, it's still very early days. They just announced the results of the 2a trials.
COOPER: So, that's a clinical trial. But, like an early on?
BROWN: Early, early on. Yeah.
COOPER: They've done mice trials, but also limited in humans?
BROWN: They tried it in mice. They've also tried it on, basically, skin that's been thrown away from plastic surgery procedures, so they've like grown --
COOPER: That's a nice image, the skin that is thrown away from --
BROWN: Yeah, like a sideburn, maybe has some stubble on it.
(LAUGH)
BROWN: But, yes. And so they've tested it about -- I think it's just a little under a hundred human beings so far. Yeah.
COOPER: And it doesn't -- I mean, based on your article, the current products which are I guess like Rogaine, Finasteride and there's that third, the Minoxidil.
BROWN: Right, yeah.
COOPER: That doesn't create new hair, that just --
BROWN: Yeah. They're sort of -- they're maintenance drugs, and so they'll help you keep what you have. But they won't grow hair. They won't regrow hair in parts of the scalp that have already gone bald.
COOPER: And this is not -- there's another procedure which is injecting your own blood that's been spun into your forehead -- into your scalp.
BROWN: Right.
COOPER: PRP.
BROWN: PRP, yeah, exactly. And so there's, I mean, there's sort of a whole galaxy of different things that -- laser helmets, of course transplants.
COOPER: But the promise of this is that it actually grows new hair.
BROWN: It -- so far.
COOPER: Supposedly.
BROWN: In theory. In theory, exactly. It actually grows new hair on parts of the scalp that have like, long since basically given up. COOPER: So what is the timeline for, I mean, what's the company doing this and what's the timeline for it?
BROWN: So the timeline, it's a little bit hard to say. Hopefully, things will -- the FDA will continue to like what it sees, and so we may be able to get our hands on it in three years or four years maybe.
COOPER: There's plenty of things though that have clinical trials, show success in mice, and as you pointed out on the article, mice skin is, I guess, thinner than human skin.
BROWN: Right.
COOPER: That's why it's important to have human clinical trials. But a lot of stuff works in mice that does not work in humans.
BROWN: Right. So a lot of things will perform really well in 2a trials and then fizzle in Phase 3. And so, that's kind of where we're at now. We're kind of crossing our fingers and waiting to see. But, TBD I suppose.
COOPER: There's a -- you kind of discovered this Reddit group of hundreds of thousands of people who are very excited about this.
BROWN: Yes. The Tressless sub-Reddit is --
COOPER: Tressless?
BROWN: Tressless, exactly, the biggest community, biggest forum for the bald and balding on the internet. And so, basically this is all they talk about pretty much now. Yeah.
COOPER: And among that, there's -- this has been like percolating for months, information about it.
BROWN: So about a year, I guess last spring, they first heard about this, the Phase 1 results were kind of promising. And so all of a sudden, this just sort of exploded into this huge sort of blast of enthusiasm for this drug. And so, it's been kind of a little bit of a slow build, but now, it's really, yeah, kind of their main obsession.
COOPER: I mean, the potential, just as we've seen with Ozempic and the drugs like it that have followed on, I mean, the potential market for this would be huge.
BROWN: Absolutely. People spend millions, hundreds of millions, probably billions on hair loss treatments. And so, if this were the thing that could actually reverse hair loss, then I think they would've a hit on their hands. Yeah.
COOPER: Oh, Lane Brown, it's fascinating article --
