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The Lead with Jake Tapper

U.S. Stocks End Higher On Signs Of Easing Trade Tension With China, Strong Jobs Data; Tennessee Police Release Abrego Garcia Traffic Stop Video; Inside Mexico's Crackdown On Drug Cartels In Sinaloa; Gov. Josh Green (D-HI), Is Interviewed About RFK Jr. Asks CDC To Look At Alternative Measles Treatments; Gaza-Bound Aid Ship Catches Fire After Alleged Drone Attack. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired May 02, 2025 - 17:00   ET

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

[17:00:00]

KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: But most importantly and more important than all of that, Jen has been a friend and a mentor to so many people at this network.

So we just want to say congratulations, Jen. There she is. We love you so much. We're so thrilled for you and your husband, John, and we're so excited for your next chapter. Our thanks. There she is. She's been in that seat like that in the control room for so long.

Don't go anywhere. The Lead with Jake Tapper starts right now.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Hey, we're bringing you some good news today about the U.S. economy. The Lead starts right now.

A better than expected jobs report providing some economic relief perhaps. How long can the good news last? Economists are warning that higher prices are coming quick. In our Small Business series today, we're asking business owners how are the tariffs impact them?

Plus, stunning, rare comments from Prince Harry revealing he's not on speaking terms anymore with his father, King Charles. What else Prince Harry said in a new emotional interview today? That's coming up.

And a must see. CNN in Mexico as troops hunt down drug cartels. What a cartel member told our reporter and the moment why our interview had to be cut.

Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper. Today, it is something of a mixed bag for the U.S. economy. Let's start with the good news. U.S. stocks today are rallying, closing up. The S and P 500 now on its longest winning streak in 20 years. The S and P 500 and the Nasdaq have now recovered the losses from the day Trump announced those widespread tariffs and everything went into free fall.

Couple reasons why markets seem optimistic, China says it is currently assessing proposals by the United States to begin trade talks. Canada's prime minister today also saying he will meet with Trump next week with a focus on tariffs. Then, of course, there is also the new jobs report. The jobs market adding a Stronger than expected 177,000 jobs in April.

The unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.2 percent. President Trump today claiming economic victory on Truth Social writing, quote, gasoline just broke $1.98 a gallon, lowest in years. Mortgage rates are down. Employment strong and much more good news as billions of dollars pour in from tariffs, no inflation. The Fed should lower its rate.

Now, some of those claims are true. Mortgage rates are dropping. The jobs report was stronger than expected. The gas thing, completely not true. Gas is not even close to $1.98 a gallon. The national average as of today, about $3, 18 cents a gallon, according to AAA.

The idea, of course, also that there's no inflation. I mean, false. And since Trump brought up the subject of tariffs, here's the potential bad news for the U.S. economy. That's part of this mixed bag. Americans are just about to start feeling the impacts of the massive 145 percent tariffs on Chinese goods, economists say. Ships carrying Chinese goods with tariffs will start arriving next week.

And as of midnight last night, a major shipping loophole on Goodsworth, $800 or less, has now expired. So now economists say we should expect higher prices for all kinds of everyday items, including stuff from popular low cost Chinese e commerce sites such as SHEIN or Temu.

Let's go to CNN business editor at large Richard Quest. Richard, it seems like there's mostly good news in the U.S. economy today. Should we start feeling better about where we are and where things are headed?

RICHARD QUEST, CNN BUSINESS EDITOR AT LARGE: Yes, we should. Because the numbers you're talking about, the GDP and the employment, their rear view numbers, they tell us what happened a few months ago and they show that the economy, the Biden economy, was strong in a sense.

What we're now looking for are the forward looking numbers. Well, all those chain stores, all those fast foods and casual eating that say their numbers are down, all those companies that refuse to give guidance because they say it's too uncertain. And you talk about the exemption, the de minimis exemption. So let's wait and see.

When we start to see chatkas like this all arriving or T-shirts coming out of envelopes that cost 145 percent more than they would have done before. Now, the reality is we are not seeing yet the data from the tariffs until we see that it's well premature to suggest that sort of it's smooth economic sailing ahead. The stock market is rallying on a hope and a prayer that the worst won't happen. The data suggests otherwise.

TAPPER: All right, Richard Quest, thanks so much. Let's discuss this all now with Gene Seroka. He's the executive director of the Port of Los Angeles. And Gene, thanks for joining us.

[17:05:00] There had been a tariff exemption on Chinese goods costing less than $800. That exemption just expired last night. Walk us through how big of a deal that will be for Americans, that exemption expiring.

GENE SEROKA, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, PORT OF LOS ANGELES: Good evening, Jake. And it is a big deal. Millions of these parcels have been coming from China into the United States and it's a bit of a competition versus our overnight or next day delivery. Maybe it takes a little bit longer, but the prices have been great. Anything under that de minimis number tax and tariff free.

Now, as Richard just said, it's two and a half times more expensive for the buyer.

TAPPER: Trump put those 145 percent tariffs on Chinese goods in early April. Any cargo ships from China loaded after April 9th carried products. It's almost like they had the tariffs with them. Carried products that the tariffs would in fact, and they've mostly arrived here. Has there been a decline at the Port of Los Angeles in terms of container ships and what are you expecting in terms of any sort of drop?

SEROKA: And that's where we find ourselves today. Beginning next week, Jake, our business at the Port of Los Angeles on the import side will be down 35 percent year over year. Major American importers have said, I'm not buying anymore with these elevated tariff levels.

Let's wait and see whether it's two hours, two weeks or two months with this whipsaw effect of information coming out, I'm going to take a look at what policies can change and what talks will help alleviate this. And what we're seeing also is that on the flip side, with the retaliatory tariffs, our agriculture products are getting walloped. Central Valley of California, Red River Valley area of North Dakota, we're not able to sell those ag products. In fact, Brazil sold more soybeans in the month of March to China than ever in their history.

TAPPER: When will American consumers start to feel the direct impacts of these tariffs beyond the effect on the stock market, of course, and what will those impacts look like? We talking prices shooting up 50 percent. We're talking empty shelves. What should we prepare for ourselves for?

SEROKA: Jake, Retailers are telling me that they've got about four to six weeks of normal inventory levels remaining. And that's what the big guys who brought a lot of extra product in to pad those and bring the cost down. So four to six weeks left.

Then after that, if no trade accord or framework is reached, you'll likely see spot shortages. And for those products in demand, the prices will go up. If you're looking for that blue shirt and it's not the right size or the right style that you want, but you've got 11 purple ones that blue shirts price is going to be elevated just based on quantity that's available.

TAPPER: China says that their officials are currently assessing proposals by the U.S. to begin trade talks. At the same time, they say the U.S. must be prepared to cancel any unilateral tariff hikes. Do you think that's going to happen?

SEROKA: Well, I'm hopeful and it's a critical time because not only are we talking about this effect of the inventory levels dissipating, but we're also at the critical stage of spring and summer fashion. And then right on the heels of back to school products in the month of May, we typically see retailers putting in orders to Asia factories for the year-end holiday season.

So getting these talks started, trying to find a way to turn down the temperature, reduce these tariffs and focus on what American interests are there protecting those jobs and good companies trying to find ways to increase exports. And the China folks will do the same thing protecting their interest. But then we've got to get to the real heart of this. These goods that are coming in are American consumers fueling this economy.

TAPPER: All right, Gene Seroka, always good to have you on. Thank you so much, sir. Let's bring in CNN anchor in chief, White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins. Now, Kaitlan, President Trump is riding high on a better than expected jobs report today.

The impacts of tariffs, of course, are still looming, as you just heard from Gene. Is the president actually any closer to any deal with China or Canada or any other countries? I mean, the White House yesterday said there was going to be a big announcement by the end of the day and maybe I missed it, but I didn't hear one.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: No, there was no announcement, Jake. And obviously people have been looking at that and saying, you know, also, even if there is announcement, it's just for a top line deal, a memorandum of understanding. It's not the actual trade agreement, which obviously is incredibly complex and can take months, even potentially longer than a year to actually iron that out.

And so it is a real question of what this looks like. What we have been hearing from the White House and from Republican allies of the White House is counting on Trump's dealmaking ability saying wait and watch all of this play out as they are negotiating this over the next few weeks and months. And so that's a real question here, Jake.

[17:10:00]

But that jobs report was a glimmer of good news for the White House when they have not had hardly any on the economic front lately. They've looked at certain numbers. But this today was them saying that they defied the expectations from economists, that this was going to be a bad jobs report, that it was going to show how the president's tariff policies are impacting the labor market.

I think the question that some people at the White House still have going forward out of this is how those tariff policies are going to impact this going forward, how long the labor market can withstand the uncertainty that is being caused by the trade war that's underway right now. And that's why people are turning to the question of what is happening with China. And any hint of a conversation between the United States and China on

a potential trade, just even conversation, makes the stock market rally. And so right now, we still haven't gotten clarity from the White House on this. Obviously, China today seemed to be more open to cracking the door, open to having those conversations, that they still called for the White House to take away those unilateral tariffs that they put in place to 145 percent. No word on that yet happening, Jake, but obviously that's a big question looming over the White House.

And then Tuesday at the White House is going to be fascinating when the new Canadian prime minister is going to be visiting President Trump. Their first meeting since the election happened. And he's been talking about this, what this is going to look like.

They're not just talking about the tariff policy, but also the relationship between Canada and the United States overall, Jake. And I thought something was really interesting that he announced today, which is that they have invited King Charles to come and visit Canada to deliver a speech later this month in May that is seen by some as a rebuke of President Trump, obviously, because Canada, technically King Charles is the head of the official state there. And as Trump has been arguing repeatedly and saying he's not kidding when he says he wants to make Canada the 51st date, they are making that invitation pretty strategically, Jake.

TAPPER: All right, Kaitlan Collins, thanks so much. And tonight, Kaitlin's guest will be Democratic Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett of Texas. That's on The Source with Kaitlan Collins tonight at 9:00, only here on CNN.

And later here on the lead. I'm going to speak with a small business owner who's suing Trump over his tariffs. But first, new video of deported immigrant, undocumented immigrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia confronted in the 2022 traffic stop. California Senator Alex Padilla will weigh in on Trump's controversial deportations and the powerful and dangerous cartel. CNN traveling to Mexico to see the new war on drugs firsthand.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:16:35]

TAPPER: In our law and justice lead, new video shows Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the undocumented Salvadoran man from Maryland who the U.S. government acknowledged it mistakenly deported back to El Salvador. He wasn't supposed to ever go back there, according to a judge. The video in a 2022 traffic stop with Tennessee state law enforcement, which did not result in any charges. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)(

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How many rolls have you got in here? Four.

KILMAR ABREGO GARCIA, MARYLAND RESIDENT: Where?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Four seats. Four rows of seats? ABREGO GARCIA: Yes. Three seats. Yes. we did. Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Y'all put an extra one in?

ABREGO GARCIA: Huh?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did y'all put another one in?

ABREGO GARCIA: No.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They come like this.

ABREGO GARCIA: The truck?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've never seen one with that many seats in it.

ABREGO GARCIA: What did you say? It's my boss.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I said I've never seen one with that many seats.

ABREGO GARCIA: Oh, really?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. That's why I was asking if you'd put an extra in.

ABREGO GARCIA: No, it's the same like this.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. Nothing illegal?

ABREGO GARCIA: Nothing, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No. No drugs or anything.

ABREGO GARCIA: No, no.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Herbs?

ABREGO GARCIA: No, nothing. Nothing illegal.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Okay. And if urn my dog, he's -- will he tell anything?

ABREGO GARCIA: Yes, it's fine.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: The Trump administration continues to argue that traffic stop supports their claims that Abrego Garcia was a member of the MS-13 gang and was involved in human trafficking. But there were no charges or arrests that resulted from that stop.

Let's bring in Democratic Senator Alex Padilla from California, who met with Garcia's wife last month. Senator, since the deportation of Abrego Garcia, we've learned a lot more about him and the alleged abuse towards his wife. USA Today obtained audio of his wife from a court hearing in 2020, asking a judge for protection against Abrego Garcia.

Now, since then, she's backed off that. But the police report and that audio stand. Should Democrats, do you think, continue to push for this specific individual's return from El Salvador? Or maybe the situation is more complicated that than it initially seemed?

REP. ALEX PADILLA (D-CA): Yes. Well, Jake, good to be back with you. Look, I appreciate the question, but whether you're talking to me, whether you're talking to Senator Van Hollen or any other one of our colleagues, I think our advocacy here has a little bit less to do with him individually and more the process.

The process and the fact, the lack of due process that this administration continues to act with. The laws are clear in this country. You know, even if you are undocumented, you have the right to due process, whether it's Kilmer himself, whether it's women, whether it's children, whether it's United States citizen children that have been deported to other countries with a lack of due process that in and of itself is problematic. And so that's really the biggest concern that we have here. It's not just the numbers, but the cruelty and the lack of due process that this administration keeps acting with.

TAPPER: So, J.D. Vance, the Vice president, after this protective, a protective order was obtained by Fox that we've also talked about on the show, J.D. Vance wrote just a simple Maryland father, and then he wrote in parentheses, trafficking humans who received no due process, and then wrote in parentheses two immigrant court hearings concluding in a valid deportation order.

[17:20:09]

And then he says, why do congressional Democrats care more about this man than the victims of illegal immigrant crime? What is your response to him? Not to the accusation about Democrats, but specifically about the fact in that argument that there was due process, that he did appear before courts.

PADILLA: Yes. So he had a deportation order. And as we've seen in a lot of other instances, too, people with these orders but still have yet another day in court and opportunity to make their case. And it kind of goes back to the need to update and modernize our immigration system and our immigration laws as a whole.

Yes, it's true. There are many millions, frankly, undocumented immigrants in the United States. A lot of them with pending appointments to make their case in front of a hearing officer, in front of an immigration judge that should be taking place in a matter of weeks and months, not years and years. That's currently the case. You have a lot of people who have done right by sort of registering with the Department of Homeland Security and check in periodically as they're required to do.

But what the Trump administration has done, instead of honoring that, they will utilize people showing up to their appointments as required to detain them and deport them expeditiously. That's not the way to do it. You know, the vast majority of immigrants in this country are law abiding, taxpaying, raising families, and have been here for years, in many cases decades.

Nobody is contesting the prioritization of locating and deporting violent criminals. That's what the president ran on, but that's far from what he's actually doing and the way in which they're doing it. You know, you have ICE facilities in the United States, appropriately so.

But when you're paying the government of El Salvador, a country with a history rich in human rights violations, to detain immigrants from the United States, when you're paying, you know, incredible amounts of money to detain migrants in Guantanamo Bay, it's a whole different ballgame that we've dealt with historically.

TAPPER: I wonder how much you are hearing from, as we are on The Lead from American citizens, Latinos, but citizens of this country who are now so fearful about what might happen to them, they carry their American passports with them. They refrain from speaking Spanish in public. They just don't want any sort of problem from the government, even though they are citizens. You're a member of the Latino community in California. How widespread is that?

PADILLA: Yes. And a proud son of immigrants from Mexico. You know, I'll tell you this, Jake, the fear is real. The anxiety is real because of the cruelty and intensity with which this administration seems to be pursuing their objectives. And it's not limited to, you know, the workplace or when ICE officers and others are entering churches to try to round people up when they're entering schools. You saw a report just a couple weeks ago of federal agents trying to speak with elementary school children. Right.

These are not hardened, violent adult criminals. We're talking about third, fourth, fifth graders. That is just wrong. And there's an economic connection to this. Jake, you were talking in previous segments about the state of the economy. Prices are up. Right.

There's a lot of consumers on edge when immigrants represent such significant elements of the necessary workforce in agriculture, in hospitality, in construction, in transportation, in health care and childcare and beyond. You know, we ought to be able to distinguish between those violent criminals everybody agrees should be the target and the priority with the vast majority of immigrants who happen to be here unlawfully, they overstayed a visa or whatever their circumstance was, but are so critical to keep our economy going.

Despite the rhetoric and the horrible policies that the Trump administration is bringing about, there's a reason that the economy shrank in the first quarter of this year despite Donald Trump clearly inheriting a strong economy from President Biden.

TAPPER: All right, Senator Alex Padilla, Democrat of California, thanks so much. Next, a must see report.

PADILLA: Thanks.

TAPPER: Inside Mexico's war on drugs. What a suspected cartel member told CNN about President Trump calling folks like him a terrorist. Plus, the moment our interview had to be cut short.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:29:01]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is actually an executive order designating the cartels and other organizations to be foreign terrorist organizations.

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: That's a big one.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, sir.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: One of President Trump's very first executive orders was to designate drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. And now CNN's Natasha Bertrand reports for us that the Trump administration is considering labeling some suspected cartels inside the United States as enemy combatants. You heard that term a lot after the 9/11 attacks. Enemy combatants.

Sources tell CNN that label could strip these individuals of any legal rights. It could theoretically justify potential lethal strikes against them.

We've also seen the president pressure the Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum, to take more action against the cartels in Mexico. He has threatened tariffs and military strikes. The Mexican government has responded. It sent hundreds of troops to the state of Sinaloa. So CNN's brand new international correspondent Isobel Yeung also went there to see this drug war firsthand.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

[17:30:14]

ISOBEL YEUNG, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): We're with the Mexican military in the state of Sinaloa, the heartland of the infamous Sinaloa cartel. Soldiers find and burn acres of marijuana and poppies that would otherwise be turned into heroin.

YEUNG: They're just looking for a place to land now, which isn't easy given that it's just hills and trees everywhere.

YEUNG (voice-over): But it's synthetic drugs, like fentanyl and meth, that are produced by the cartels in enormous quantities, generate huge profits, and are responsible for most overdose deaths in the U.S. They're often made in remote, rural areas.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through audio translator): OK, look over here. This is an area with chemical products. Everything here will be destroyed.

YEUNG: This is pretty tough work. I mean, they're wearing full on hazmat suits. They have to wear masks because these drugs, obviously, and the chemicals are very, very potent. But they're just trying to make sure that the cartels don't come back and finish making the drugs here.

YEUNG (voice-over): Over a six-month period, thousands of suspected cartel members have been arrested across Mexico, and more than and 140 tons of drugs have been seized. But the reality is more than 1,200 people have also been killed in Sinaloa in the past year.

Hundreds more have disappeared, fueled by a vengeful war between two rival factions of the Sinaloa cartel. In downtown Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa, the military's narrative that they are fully in control begins to unravel.

YEUNG: Very stark reminders here of people who are missing, who have been disappeared as part of this cartel war between the two factions that's playing out right now, all very recent cases. This was last week, 23-year-old went missing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Those, you cannot say if they are real.

YEUNG: What do you mean?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Those flyers are old.

YEUNG: No, this is post the date here. This is 22nd of March. They went missing, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through audio translator): Yes, but this is a copy. This is a copy. Who put this? We don't know.

YEUNG (voice-over): As we're talking, a soldier blocks our camera.

YEUNG: You mean it's not verified? Yes. Presumably people aren't just putting up posters for the fun of it, they're putting them up because they're missing family members, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't know.

YEUNG: What -- what's up? You don't want us filming it?

YEUNG (voice-over): The military steer us off and invite us to film something else. But we call the number on the poster of the missing woman. Her name is Vivian Aispuro. Her family tell us she disappeared 17 days ago. We promised to follow up on her story.

But who are the men running this criminal network wreaking havoc on people living here? We part ways with the military.

YEUNG: So we've just entered an area of the city that is still very dangerous. After weeks of trying, our contact here on the ground has managed to secure a meeting with a member of the cartel who's involved, apparently, in the production of drugs. And so we're meeting him now in somewhere around here in an undisclosed location.

(through audio translator): How are you?

YEUNG (voice-over): This man is talking to us on the condition we hide his identity and location.

YEUNG: Can I pull up a chair?

YEUNG (voice-over): He says he produces fentanyl for the Sinaloa cartel.

YEUNG: How safe or dangerous is this area to be in?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through audio translator): Right now, all areas are dangerous.

YEUNG: The Mexican military are making a big effort to crack down on the drug production here. How are you responding to that? And how does that impact your work?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through audio translator): They're doing a good job. There are more of them now, so we have to find a way to keep doing this, to keep working. Of course, one a smaller scale, not the same as before. But it continues.

YEUNG: I mean, according to the Trump administration, you are a terrorist. I mean, the cartels have been labeled a foreign terrorist organization. What do you make of that?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through audio translator): Well, the situation is ugly. But we have to eat.

YEUNG: What's your message to Donald Trump, if he's watching this?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through audio translator): My respect. According to him, he's looking out for his people, but the problem is the consumers are in the United States. If there weren't any consumers, we would stop.

YEUNG: There is a lot of violence playing out on these streets here at the moment every day, right? I mean, people are dying on a daily basis. Children are afraid to go to school. Do you have any sense of remorse over your role and your involvement in this group?

[17:35:02]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through audio translator): Of course. Of course. Of course. Things are sad, but well, things are sad.

YEUNG (voice-over): His phone is pinging. Someone is nearby. He tells us we need to leave for our own safety.

But it's because of the action of cartel members like these that civilians, too, are caught up in the violence. Vivian Aispuro, the missing woman from the poster we saw two days ago, was one of them. Her body has just been found.

YEUNG: I'm so sorry for your loss, I really am. Are you able to tell me a little bit about your sister?

ALMA AISPURO, SISTER OF VICTIM (through audio translator): She was very loved. She really like cats, Harry Styles, Lady Gaga. We wanted to go to her concert together. Not anymore.

YEUNG (voice-over): Vivian's sister believes she wasn't directly involved with the cartels. But the conflict here has broken all norms, she says, and violence has come for everyone, including women and children.

YEUNG: I mean, the authorities are saying that they're going after the bad guys, they're making a lot of arrests, they're going after the drugs, they're going after the weapons. Do you feel like they're not doing enough?

AISPURO (through audio translator): No, they're not doing anything. Culiacan has become a place where it's impossible to live.

YEUNG: Thank you for talking with us. I mean, you're being so, so strong. She'd be so proud of you.

AISPURO (through audio translator): Thank you very much, really.

YEUNG: Thank you.

AISPURO (through audio translator): Thank you for telling my sister's story.

YEUNG (voice-over): For Vivian's family, the authorities' efforts amount to nothing more than anguish.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through audio translator): My daughter.

Isobel Yeung, CNN, Sinaloa, Mexico.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TAPPER: Powerful report from our new reporter, Isobel Yeung. Thank you so much.

New today from the CDC, measles cases in the U.S. surpassing the 900 mark for the year. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is proposing alternative treatments to try to bring those numbers down, such as vitamins. At what risk does he make those suggestions? Alaska physician turned to Democratic governor who has repeatedly called out RFK Jr. for his misguided approach towards medicine. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:41:58]

TAPPER: Our Health Lead now, Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. is asking the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC, to look at treating measles, a highly contagious disease, with medications and other therapies, such as vitamins. Now, HHS does recognize that the measles vaccine is the most effective way to prevent the disease, but they also recognize people's choice not to get vaccinated under RFK Jr. Joining us now to discuss is Doctor and Democratic Governor of Hawaii, Josh Green. Governor, while serving as Lieutenant Governor, you helped lead an emergency medical mission to help stop the measles epidemic in Samoa at a time when RFK Jr. and his activists were leading an effort to discredit the vaccine on -- on Samoa. Are alternative therapies, such as vitamins, effective at all in treating measles?

GOV. JOSH GREEN (D-HI): Not really, only if people are severely malnourished and then, you know, you try to get their nourishment up and that's where you use vitamin A. But not in places like Texas, Louisiana. The distraction causes more harm than good.

We really just have to tell everyone to get vaccinated. We, in Samoa, went and vaccinated 37,000 people and, you know, the measles stopped. What RFK Jr. is doing is, he is casting a shadow over good science and that will confuse people, they won't get vaccinated and we'll get more cases, not fewer, of measles.

TAPPER: What do you say to parents, and I'm sure you have some in Hawaii, who are hesitant or mistrustful of vaccines?

GREEN: We say we respect you. We can have differences of ideology but still do good public health. What we did in our state is we allowed people who had religious -- religious exemptions from vaccinations, we allowed them to get the vaccination for measles, mumps and rubella without losing their exemption because of the concern, because of the outbreak.

We did have two cases here in Hawaii. That would be a good national move for RFK Jr. to do. But really what we do is we tell people it's safe, we show them the research and we don't get into conflicts with them and we don't misdirect to other treatments.

Unfortunately, what RFK Jr. does is he practices public health malpractice because he doesn't go to the core of the solution, which is vaccination programs and he should call for a national movement for vaccinations.

TAPPER: You also helped lead Hawaii's vaccination campaign during the COVID pandemic. Earlier this week, HHS said it will require that all new vaccines be tested in placebo-controlled trials before they are licensed for use. What do you think of that?

GREEN: I think it's another effort to cast doubt on vaccinations. This is preposterous because what they're doing is they fundamentally don't believe in vaccination programs. It's evident to all of us that RFK Jr. has some kind of motivation to move the country away from vaccinations, even though he kind of spins vaccinations occasionally as -- as necessary.

[17:45:04]

But they're making -- they're making it more difficult. They're making it less science-based, actually. They are flying in the face of decades and decades of research. And the problem is when vaccination rates fall below 95 percent for measles or under 90 percent in -- in public schools, you see big outbreaks.

And so every time you put a new barrier in the way of getting people vaccinated or you discourage them from trusting vaccinations, you see those numbers drop and then very, very vulnerable people get crushed by these viruses. One in five people with measles will end up in the hospital, one in a thousand will die. And we had a lot of fatalities from COVID in spite of what people like RFK Jr. might say.

So it's very unfortunate. He's not doing the President any favors. He's certainly not doing moms and dads and children any favors.

TAPPER: So as I understand it, this move to require placebo-based trials as well raises questions about how this new rule will impact the way updated COVID booster shots can get cleared each virus season. I mean, there's a new COVID shot and a new flu shot every season. What will be the impact if this added placebo-based testing is required?

GREEN: Massive delays. One of the challenges here is that the viruses change every year. They mutate slightly. And so if they put in new protocols for additional placebo-based protocol and study, you could miss a whole season.

It really does smell like they're trying to delay enough to devastate the vaccination discipline. And it's -- it's insane to do that. You know, we were able to eradicate measles and now they're back. We were able to suppress pertussis, now it's back. And COVID, especially the Delta variant, which we all experienced tragically in the early phases of -- of the disease and the outbreak, killed so many people. And it hospitalized thousands and thousands of people in rural areas.

It's big trouble if we go the route that RFK Jr. is going. He is really trying to apply an anti-vaccine ideology to his job. And this is the last job in the country that should be doing that.

So I hope the President replaces him soon. I hope that after the next flu season, when we have a lot more flu and a lot more suffering, that they really move on. Because again, this is not partisan. This is not political. After all, I may be a Democratic physician governor, but RFK was a member of the Democratic Party. He's just bad news for healthcare and public health.

TAPPER: Yes.

GREEN: Please, please, President, make a change.

TAPPER: Physician and Governor Josh Green of the great state of Hawaii, thank you so much.

[17:47:50]

Next, that midnight Mayday call from a ship, a flotilla that says that they're carrying desperately needed aid to Gaza that was hit by a drone. What we're learning about the incident, what we're learning about who could be responsible, that's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) TAPPER: We're back with our World Lead. In the aftermath of a Gaza- bound aid flotilla from human rights activists hit by a suspected drone. The activist organization trying to deliver that aid says that Israel is to blame, but offered no evidence. Israel's not commenting.

CNN's Jeremy Diamond is in Tel Aviv. Jeremy, tell us more about how this attack went down.

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Jake, the Freedom Flotilla Coalition said that one of its ships was struck just after midnight last night, local time, by an Israeli drone.

They say that two drone strikes hit the front of the ship, targeting the ship's generator, apparently, that was there. And you can see some of the damage that was done to that ship in these images and also in this video, which shows the ship in flames. One of the videos, also you can hear the sound of some kind of an explosion.

Now, we at CNN can't independently verify what caused that damage, but the Israeli military, we've asked them for comment, they have declined to comment on this incident. And that's notable in part because Israel does have a history of targeting these types of ships that have tried to break various Israeli blockades on Gaza.

You'll recall an incident back in 2010 when Israeli naval commandos actually boarded one of these ships, killing 10 people, in an incident that grabbed international headlines.

In addition to that, there was also an Israeli Air Force C-130 that was observed just off the coast of Malta, flying at a very low altitude, crisscrossing the area. That is a plane that can be used as a transport plane, but also as a surveillance plane. And that happened in the hours before this strike actually occurred.

Now, this ship was actually headed to Malta to pick up a number of prominent activists, including the climate and human rights activist Greta Thunberg. They were preparing to sail towards Gaza in the hopes of trying to break, or at least draw attention to, Israel's now two- month blockade of the Gaza Strip.

[17:55:06]

Indeed, it has been two months today since Israel allowed any kind of food, water, medical supplies into Gaza. Israel says that it is carrying out this siege to try and pressure Hamas into releasing the hostages, but human rights organizations, including these activists, say that Israel is committing a war crime by using starvation as a weapon of war. Jake?

TAPPER: All right, Jeremy Diamond in Tel Aviv, thank you so much.

Some big news just in, weeks ahead of the busy Memorial Day holiday weekend, why United Airlines is cutting several flights at a busy international airport. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [18:00:04]

TAPPER: Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper. This hour, some good news today when it comes to the U.S. economy.