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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Hantavirus Cases On The Rise; Epstein Survivor Says DOJ Revealed Her Identity; Victim's Family Claims ChatGPT Encouraged FSU Shooter; Trump Pushed DOJ To Subpoena Reporters Over Alleged Leaks; Canvas Says Data Stolen In Hack Has Been Returned. Aired 6-7p ET

Aired May 12, 2026 - 18:00   ET

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

[18:00:00]

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper.

This hour, there are now 11 cases of Hantavirus linked to the Hondius cruise ship, and we could see more cases in the coming weeks. That's the news from the head of the World Health Organization earlier today. He says, while more people may test positive, he does not see any signs of a larger outbreak at this time. We're going to break down the risk with two top infectious disease experts in just moments.

Plus, Epstein survivors testifying during a hearing in Florida earlier today, just a short walk from the courthouse where that pedophile got a sweetheart deal back in 2008. One survivor revealing that she chose to stay anonymous, only to have the Justice Department reveal her identity more than 500 times in the Epstein files. An attorney for some of the survivors joins us to react ahead.

Plus, we've got a new installment of our series, A.I., Friend or Foe. Just a few weeks ago, we told you about a Florida case, a criminal investigation over OpenAI and over whether the company bears any responsibility for the shooting at Florida State University last year. And now the family of one of the shooting victims is suing the company as well, alleging that ChatGPT encouraged the shooter's delusions ahead of the attack. A lawyer for that family joins us ahead.

The Lead tonight, the number of Hantavirus cases rises to 11. The World Health Organization confirmed this in an update earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. TEDROS ADHANOM GHEBREYESUS, DIRECTOR-GENERAL, WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION: At the moment, there is no sign that we are seeing the start of a larger outbreak, but, of course, the situation could change. It's possible we might see more cases in the coming weeks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: The World Health Organization says all 11 cases are linked to the outbreak on the M.V. Hondius cruise ship, and all of the patients are currently isolated under medical supervision. Just one positive case among that 11 is part of the contingent of 18 cruise passengers who returned home to the United States on Monday. That person remains asymptomatic and is in a biocontainment unit at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. That's also where 15 of the other passengers are isolating in rooms at the National Quarantine Unit.

Travel Blogger Jake Rosmarin, sorry, posted an update today from his room there, where he says he remains asymptomatic and even received his first really good iced coffee in six weeks, delivered by the nurses.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAKE ROSMARIN, TRAVEL BLOGGER: This is everything I needed right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Two U.S. passengers are currently at Atlanta's Emory University Hospital, where one passenger is showing symptoms, and we've just learned their test results.

CNN's Jacqueline Howard is there. Jacqueline, what are you learning?

JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN HEALTH REPORTER: That's right, Jake. We have just learned that their test result came back as negative. This is according to a post on X that the Department of Health and Human Services put out earlier today. In that post, they do say that the mildly symptomatic U.S. passenger taken to Emory in Atlanta tested negative for the Andes variant of Hantavirus. But, of course, Jake, that passenger will still continue to be monitored closely here at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.

The second passenger who was brought here to Atlanta, they're actually the close contact of that first passenger, and they have not shown symptoms, but they're also still being monitored here. And in that post on X, Jake, the Department of Health and Human Services also mentioned that all 16 passengers who arrived in Nebraska, they currently remain asymptomatic. But as we know, they will still be monitored.

The World Health Organization's recommendation is that the cruise ship passengers be monitored actively either at a specified quarantine facility or at home for 42 days from the last exposure. And the World Health Organization says the last exposure is the 10th of May, which takes that 42-day window through June 21st.

So, Jake, again, these passengers can expect to continue to be monitored for symptoms through June 21st. Jake?

TAPPER: All right. Jacqueline Howard outside Emory University Hospital, thank you so much.

Joining us now, Dr. Craig Spencer from the Brown University Pandemic Center, and Dr. Steven Bradfute, an immunologist and associate professor at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine.

Dr. Bradfute, the head of the World Health Organization said today he does expect more cases to emerge in the coming weeks. How big of a risk to the public is the Hantavirus outbreak? How concerned should we be?

DR. STEVEN BRADFUTE, IMMUNOLOGIST AND ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, UNM SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: Yes. So, it's really going to depend on how much contact these individuals had with infected patients when these patients were showing symptoms.

[18:05:02]

There is a quite long incubation period of the virus from the time you get infected to the time you become sick. But there's nothing about this outbreak that is different from other Andes virus outbreaks in the past, as long as you isolate individuals that are sick and do contact tracing. It's something that should be able to be contained.

TAPPER: Dr. Spencer, right now, officials are also monitoring people in nine states who either disembarked from the cruise earlier or were otherwise exposed to confirmed cases. Do you think officials are casting a wide enough net when it comes to potentially exposed individuals, or do you think it's too wide a net? How would you assess the level of caution here?

DR. CRAIG SPENCER, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF PUBLIC HEALTH, BROWN UNIVERSITY: That's a really good question. Look, this is bread and butter public health. This is what my colleagues at the CDC have done for a really long time. I want to add that I think the WHO has done a fantastic job coordinating and communicating, and I agree with the director-general there that we will likely see a few more cases, including probably in the U.S. in the coming weeks. That wouldn't surprise me. But I don't expect to see hundreds or thousands of more cases.

What I do expect is that we'll have our local and state health departments that will do the work that they need to monitor symptoms, to make sure that people have access to the treatment and care that they need. And throughout this whole process, I expect that we're going to learn a lot more about a virus that we already think we know quite a bit about.

TAPPER: Dr. Bradfute, we've seen an uptick in cases, but all of the cases were tied to this cruise. Only three led to deaths. Obviously, three is three too many, but, you know, compared to pandemics that we're all familiar with, three is relatively small. Do you attribute that to more rapid response by medical professionals or other factors?

BRADFUTE: I mean, it's probably a combination. The largest outbreak that's been recorded for this particular virus is 34 people over a period of two months. So, overall, these infections can be contained with good public health measures.

TAPPER: Dr. Spencer, some doctors have been critical of how the U.S. government has been messaging this outbreak. For an example in a post from the Health and Human Services Department account about the U.S citizens who arrived back in the U.S. on Monday, HHS wrote on this post, quote, another passenger tested mildly PCR positive for the Andes virus. Now, doctors and others swarm to ask what mildly PCR positive means. How would you rate the U.S. government messaging, and do you think that their response, at least in that case, could be adding to public confusion?

SPENCER: I think that that's absolutely the case. Look, it turns out communicating during public health crises is really, really hard. And a lot of the folks in power now in these positions were really critical of the U.S. messaging during COVID. And I think they're finding that it's hard to balance that line between reassuring folks, providing the right clarity.

That HHS tweet was really confusing to me. I didn't know what to make of that. Was the patient symptomatic? Were they positive? I think what we're seeing is that we need to have really strong folks in these positions. I'm hearing from a lot of my friends at the CDC that are just like, when I ask them what they want the world to know, they're saying, please just tell everyone that we want to just do our effing jobs, is what they've told me.

And what we have now is we have a director at the CDC who also happens to be the director at the NIH, and doing two different jobs at the same time, it's really, really hard. We need clear, committed communication at this point. The problem is that we were flat-footed as a country here. We weren't engaging with the WHO, as we normally had. We had to ask for an exemption for the CDC to work with the WHO. And the result was that instead of being kind of two steps in front, we found ourselves two weeks behind.

TAPPER: Yes. And we should note Dr. Bhattacharya, who you referred to, who's the head of the NIH, he's the acting director of the CDC as well, but there is no confirmed CDC director. There's also no confirmed U.S. surgeon general. There's also, as of today, no confirmed FDA commissioner because President Trump got rid of the one that there was.

Dr. Bradfute, how much do we not know about the Hantavirus or this strain? Because we knew nothing about COVID-19 back when, six years ago. Is this different?

BRADFUTE: Yes. So, this virus has been known since the mid-1990s. One of its relatives, Sin Nombre Hantavirus, was the first hantavirus that caused disease discovered in the Western Hemisphere, and that was in the Four Corners area, again, in 1993. A few years later, Andes virus was discovered in South America.

So, it has been recognized for a while. We understand the disease course. There are no known therapeutics or vaccines against it, although these are areas of research from my lab and other labs across the world. And it's important that early detection of infection is important so that clinicians can provide supportive care to try to minimize the disease impact.

So, these are dangerous viruses. They don't spread terribly well. We know some things about them, but I think we'll learn a lot as we continue to study this virus. [18:10:03]

TAPPER: Dr. Spencer, the patients in quarantine right now, what do we know about how they're being monitored? What kinds of tests are they going through to make sure that they're healthy?

SPENCER: Well, the most important thing is just following symptoms, if people become symptomatic, providing testing. And I think this is a really important reminder for the American public who probably assumes that we have this capacity in the background to deal with any scary disease at a moment's notice, but this took really dedicated funding. The Nebraska facility has been around for two decades, but we also have 13 other centers kind of like that, that are able to take care of specialized patients all over the U.S. They're always on the ready.

But those need a lot of resources, a lot of training, a lot of providers, and it's important that we continue, whether there's a hantavirus or any other virus in the news, to support those centers, to support those hospitals and facilities even when another infectious threat might not be in front of our eyes because another one will undoubtedly be on the horizon.

TAPPER: All right. Dr. Craig Spencer and Dr. Steven Bradfute, thank you so much to both of you.

As we just referenced today, we learned that FDA Commissioner Marty Makary is leaving his position. This is just days after President Trump reportedly signed off on having him fired. When asked about the reports on Friday by The Wall Street Journal and by CNN, Trump denied any knowledge of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPORTER: What's going on with Marty Makary?

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: Nothing much.

REPORTER: Are you going to fire him?

TRUMP: I've been reading about it, but I know nothing about it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Today at the White House, President Trump seemed to be all caught up.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPORTER: Did you ask Marty Makary to resign, sir, or did you fire your FDA commissioner?

TRUMP: Well, I don't want to say, but Marty's a great guy. He was having some difficulty.

(END VIDEO CLIP) TAPPER: Makary leaving means Trump, as I noted, will now need to fill yet another vacancy within the Health and Human Services Department, which already lacks a permanent leader at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a permanent U.S. surgeon general, now a permanent FDA commissioner, all while health officials are working to contain a Hantavirus outbreak.

Today, House Democrats launched what they're calling a new phase of their investigation into the dead pedophile, Jeffrey Epstein, and his network. What does that look like? An attorney representing Epstein survivors joins me live next to explain.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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TAPPER: In our Law and Justice Lead, we head to West Palm Beach, Florida, and the ongoing Congressional investigation into Jeffrey Epstein. Today, Epstein survivors testified in a hearing held by Democrats, the minority on the House Oversight Committee.

Roza testified for the first time. Her identity had been kept hidden as Jane Doe until the Justice Department released its files on the dead pedophile late last year.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROZA, EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: I woke up one day with my name mentioned over 500 times.

I can only imagine the long-term impact this mistake will have on my life.

Releasing my name while redacting the name of other powerful is not a mistake, it's a choice. It's a choice to prioritize the comfort of institution over the safety of the survivors.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Roza says she was abused by Epstein over a three-year period while he was under house arrest for his 2008 state prostitution charges over his involvement with underage girls. His house arrest part of that sweetheart plea deal negotiated by then U.S. attorney, then after that Trump Labor Secretary Alex Acosta.

My next guest also testified in today's hearing. Spencer Kuvin is an attorney and represents several Epstein survivors. Spencer, why was it important for you to testify even without Republicans, who are obviously the controllers of Congress and the House Oversight Committee, without Republicans there?

SPENCER KUVIN, EPSTEIN SURVIVORS' ATTORNEY: Thank you for having me. I think it was important for me to be able to talk to the panel today, even though it was just Democrats, to get on the record what has occurred in this case historically. I was there at the inception of these cases with victim number one, who was my client, and it was important for me to be able to walk them through some of the beginnings of this case and some of the failures by the Department of Justice, and then subsequently, and by that I mean the Department of Justice back in 2005, 2006, and then again, the Department of Justice's failures recently in disclosing a lot of the victims' names which broke the law.

TAPPER: Do you agree with Roza that that was a choice, that was done intentionally?

KUVIN: You know, there is absolutely no way that any person who hasn't used a computer doesn't know to hit control+F and search. That is all they had to do. We gave them over 300 victim names and told them, please search for these names and redact them. They didn't. They were more interested in redacting the names of powerful and influential men and other people in those files than they were in trying to protect the victims, which, by the way, again, broke the law.

TAPPER: The top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, Congressman Robert Garcia of California, he says he has more questions for Alex Acosta, the U.S. attorney who negotiated that sweetheart deal with Epstein. He also wants to hear from Florida officials and prosecutors who played a role in that sweetheart deal. What questions might you have for them?

KUVIN: Well, I gave them some today. One of the representatives had asked some of the questions that I would ask, and they were actually pointed questions with respect to the unreleased videotapes. There are surveillance videotapes that we know existed inside of Epstein's home. We believe the FBI has custody of those tapes and has never released them. We know there were surveillance tapes taken during the investigation. It's noted in the original probable cause affidavit that the police were surveilling the home outside, watching people go in and out for days on end.

[18:20:01]

Where are those tapes?

So, at the end of the day, we want everything released, the videotapes, as well as any additional photographs Ghislaine Maxwell took. And he needs to -- they need to ask the witnesses where this evidence is and why it hasn't been produced.

TAPPER: Acosta apparently testified to the committee behind closed doors that he thought that that was the best deal he could negotiate at the time. Do you agree with that? And what do you think is the reason behind the sweetheart deal?

KUVIN: I absolutely do not agree with that. It, as I testified today, is one of the worst deals ever entered into by a U.S. attorney. This was a non-prosecution agreement that gave immunity to the pedophile perpetrator in addition to four co-conspirators, and this is what made it bizarre, unnamed co-conspirators.

This deal was absolutely awful, and we now know through going through these records with the litigation that subsequently occurred, that they were having private conversations with Epstein's attorneys asking Epstein what would he accept. They were basically begging him to accept a deal. It's absurd. It made absolutely no sense.

TAPPER: Former U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi is supposed to testify before the Oversight Committee in the coming weeks. Here are some questions the survivors say they want answers to. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JENA-LISA JONES, EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: Who are we covering for? Like, you were willing to lose your job.

DANIELLE BENSKY, EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: What was the process? And we would ask the same of Todd Blanche, what was the process for moving Ghislaine Maxwell?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: What questions do you want the committee to ask Bondi?

KUVIN: I want Bondi to answer for why the Department of Justice has broken the law, and there's no question about that. The Congress passed and the president signed a very clear bill with respect to the release of documents. They have not complied with that law. So, they are in violation of that law as we sit here today.

Secondarily, we need to know why that her office has redacted information that the law states they should never have redacted. The law is very clear that redaction should not occur merely because of embarrassment or someone who is not a victim in these files, and they have clearly redacted names in these files that are not victims, children. And we want to know why she did that, why she authorized it, and it needs to be reversed immediately.

TAPPER: Spencer Kuvin, thank you so much for your time, sir.

A new lawsuit against ChatGPT maker OpenAI alleging that the chatbot inflamed and encouraged the alleged gunman in last year's deadly Florida State University shooting. I'm going to talk to the lawyer for the family of a victim killed in that mass shooting about the lawsuit. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:25:00]

TAPPER: Now the latest in our series, A.I., Friend or Foe. Today, we're going to take a look at the risks of this developing technology. Last month, you might remember, we looked at the chilling messages between Phoenix Eichner, the suspect in last year's shooting at Florida State University, and the A.I. chatbot, ChatGPT.

For months, Eichner told the chatbot about his loneliness and his resentment. Later, when asked about weapons and violence, the chatbot failed to make any connections that a human might, that something might be wrong and authorities might need to be alerted. Instead, the chatbot explained to Eichner in detail how to disengage the safety on a gun and how the country would react to news of a mass shooting at FSU and when the school student union was busiest.

And now the widow of Tiru Chabba, one of the two victims killed in the FSU shooting, is suing ChatGPT's maker, OpenAI, alleging that the chatbot inflamed and encouraged the accused shooter's delusions ahead of the attack.

The lawsuit filed Sunday follows last month's criminal investigation by the Florida attorney general into whether OpenAI bears criminal responsibility for the shooting.

And here to discuss is the attorney representing, Vandana Joshi, Jim Bannister. Jim, thanks so much for joining us. What does the Chabba family want to see come from this lawsuit?

JIM BANNISTER, ATTORNEY REPRESENTING FAMILY OF FSU SHOOTING VICTIM: Mr. Tapper, I'll tell you Vana is a very private person. She was very reluctant to get involved in anything that might put her name out there. But she got placed into this situation outside of her own control. Obviously, she would not want to be here if she could help it.

So, ultimately, her decision to pursue suit against ChatGPT, OpenAI, was based primarily on her decision that she wanted to make sure that if she could do something that would help change the way these algorithms work, ChatGPT works, and that that might save some other mother from being put in the position that she's been in, then she was willing to trade a little bit of her privacy for trying to make a change going forward. So, she's specifically looking for some changes in ChatGPT and how it operates with users.

TAPPER: So, OpenAI, the argument you're going to face in court they say that while the FSU shooting was of course a tragedy, ChatGPT is not responsible because what the chatbot provided for Eichner is information found broadly across the internet, that he could have gotten any of that same information from Google. What is your response in court going to be?

BANNISTER: So, I think that this is analogous to a products liability case. I mean, that's the way we've pled it. And if you if you grew up here in South Carolina where I'm from, for years and years our highways did not have any dividers that ran between the lanes. And those dividers eventually were put in place because, ultimately, Highway Department realized that people were crossing over, hitting other oncoming traffic, there were guardrails that were put in place.

[18:30:05]

That was despite the fact that the users of the vehicles that were driving on the highway, the Department of Transportation didn't have any responsibility necessarily for how they were driving the car. But they could foresee the crossover crashes would occur, and they put those guardrails in to prevent that. And that is something that would be -- we believe -- would be something that should've been in place, may have been in place to some extent, but just failed in this in this situation.

I also think the question should be flipped around to say, what is unreasonable about the idea that ChatGPT shouldn't have some sort of guardrails or parameters that kick things out that seem to be dangerous or show an intent to commit a violent act? In fact, I asked ChatGPT today, what are five things that it could do to program itself in order to help prevent acts of violence in the future? And the response that I got was an enhanced context understanding, which would mean understanding in a broader sense what was going on in the conversation, which, in this case, if you are able to look at the entire chat back and forth, you can see where it is heading as it gets to that fateful day on April 17th of last year.

There's user behavior learning that it suggested. There's safety auditing, sort of think like car crash tests that auto manufacturers use to see what's working and what's not, where it's testing itself to make sure that it is not potentially opening itself up to content that could lead to violent behavior.

TAPPER: Yes. Last month, OpenAI announced the role of human reviewers who can assess flagged activity to determine whether authorities need to be notified.

A similar thing happened in Canada. They ultimately didn't tell law enforcement, and there was an even worse shooting. Would that addition be sufficient?

BANNISTER: Well, I think so. Let's start with the statement that ChatGPT came out with about that, and that is that they cut off that particular user in Canada who ended up being the shooter. So, they were apologizing officially for not having notified law enforcement.

So, what we learned from that is that ChatGPT has the ability to figure out that certain users are engaging in conduct within their system that's inappropriate, could lead to violent behavior. I don't think that an alert system is -- or how about even just a well check? There were moments in Eichner's chats where he was talking about suicide long before he came to the conclusion that he was going to --

TAPPER: Yes, he asked if it was a sin.

BANNISTER: -- get a how-to instruction. How about an off-ramp there? How about a notification to law enforcement to go take a check on this guy? I mean, they know -- I mean, with the technology that we have today with geofencing and other things, they know where you are at least roughly and can pinpoint a location, if necessary.

TAPPER: Yes. Jim Bannister, thank you so much. I really appreciate your time today.

Exactly how many of your taxpayer dollars will be used to pay for President Trump's new White House ballroom? The Senate's Republican leader tried to clarify that today, and let's just say there are a lot of zeros in this number. We'll explain.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [18:35:00]

TAPPER: A CNN exclusive in our Politics Lead, the Trump administration has asked the Federal Aviation Administration to evaluate the risks of building President Trump's proposed triumphal arch less than two miles from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. FAA regulations require a review of any structures built above 200 feet, and the total height of the arch will be at least 250 feet, representing the United States 250th birthday.

This airspace is already quite complicated. Pilots have to avoid close encounters with vehicles having to do with the Pentagon and Washington Monument and other landmarks, and, of course, the airspace has been the site of high-profile accidents, including last year's horrific collision between an American Airlines flight and a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter.

CNN crews today captured video of construction work by the road leading to the site of the proposed arch, although it's not clear if this work is related to the arch plan or cleaning the statues near the bridge, interesting stuff.

In our politics lead, the director of the U.S. Secret Service was on Capitol Hill today to push Republican senators to fund as much as $1 billion in proposed security upgrades, some of which would go to President Trump's proposed ballroom. Here is how the Senate majority leader, John Thune, of South Dakota characterized that spending.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN THUNE (R-SD): About 20 percent of that is going to be used to secure the modernization of the East Wing. Most of it is going to be used for other purposes.

We had a lot of questions that were asked by our colleagues just to get the details and, you know, precision as much as possible about how dollars are going to be used. And I think that the director did a very good job.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Over in the House, there's a bipartisan effort seeking to make major reforms to the Secret Service. A new bill would remove the federal law enforcement agency from the Department of Homeland Security and have the Secret Service report directly to the White House.

Here now to discuss are the authors of that bill, Congressman Russell Fry, a Republican from South Carolina, and Congressman Jared Moskowitz, a Democrat from Florida. Gentlemen, thanks for being here.

Congressman Fry, why does it make sense to you for the Secret Service to report to the White House and not the Department of Homeland Security?

REP. RUSSELL FRY (R-SC): Well, it's just, you know, it's one of several agencies that are under the Department of Homeland Security. And so the risk is who is actually accountable when something happens, who can advocate for themselves from a funding perspective. You're not lost in the shuffle.

Presidential security is hugely important to the country, the continuity of our constitutional republic. And so having them be directly accountable to the president, I think, makes the most sense. It provides the most flexibility.

TAPPER: And, Congressman Moskowitz, your bill would also make FEMA an independent cabinet-level agency and would move the Transportation Security Administration to the Department of Transportation instead of DHS. Why do you think DHS is the wrong place for FEMA and TSA?

REP. JARED MOSKOWITZ (D-FL): Well, it's not whether it's the wrong place. It's whether DHS has become too bureaucratic, too big and it's hard for agencies now to function and get attention and get decisions out of.

[18:40:05]

Everything funnels up to the general counsel's office. I heard it from FEMA administrators in the Biden administration. I heard it from FEMA administrators in the first Trump administration. I heard it from Secret Service when I was on the assassination task force after Butler, appointed that by the speaker. Homeland was a great idea after 9/11. It's just become too big. And so I think we need to see some reform.

Taking Secret Service out, one of the smallest agencies in Homeland, by the way, and giving it to the White House, which is their prime responsibility of safety, seems to make more sense. They can get more resources. They can be faster, make more decisions. Taking TSA and giving it over to Transportation so that you can have FAA safety in the skies, TSA safety on the ground together, and then the American people won't get caught in the crossfire when we get into these government shutdowns, which are probably going to happen more as it becomes more partisan up here.

So, this is really about efficiency. Remember, we heard a lot about that a couple years ago. This is really about government efficiency.

TAPPER: Speaking of the Secret Service, I want to ask you, because the agency's director was selling Trump's ballroom security to Republican senators. Before today's lunch, Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina warned the Democrats are going to use this issue, this billion dollars, for the ballroom, although they said it's only 20 percent of that is for the ballroom. But, anyway, the Democrats would use this against Republicans in the midterms. Quote, I know how I would write the ad for doing this when we're having $4 plus gas prices, those sorts of things.

So, Congressman Fry, leaving today's lunch, the Secret Service director declined to say how much of the proposed billion dollars specifically goes to the ballroom. What do you think? Do you support the funding for this project? FRY: I think, overall, it's a meritorious thing. I mean, for a long time, we've had this security gap. Presidents of both parties have been exposed outside of the White House in times of -- and, obviously, we've seen that play out very recently with what happened at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. So, I think that the mission is clear. This cuts from a bipartisan perspective.

What Congress is trying to do is ascertain what is going to -- you know, how much is going to what. A lot of this seems to be security upgrades for the White House complex itself, you know, which we support. But having the president and the continuity of our republic is hugely important and really ensures, you know, the safety and security of the president and their family.

TAPPER: Not every Republican is on board. Senator Susan Collins of Maine, who's the chair of the Appropriations Committee, also up for re-election said, quote, obviously, there have been three or four attempts on the president's life, and that's extremely serious, and we're in a heightened era of political violence. But the ballroom itself should be paid for by private donations, as the president had indicated. What's your take on this all?

MOSKOWITZ: Well, look, the president said he wasn't going to take down the East Wing, and then he did. The president said that the ballroom would be funded solely by private donations. I think the president needs to stay to his commitment on that.

As far as security at the White House and security obviously for the president, look, if there's an increase in funding in Secret Service budget, back to the previous topic, I mean, that's something I would support. I would support that not just for the president, but obviously for the Supreme Court, the cabinet and Congress. I mean, there's a trillion dollar industry of hate now online.

And so when it comes to keeping people safe, I would support more funding for that. But on the ballroom, I think the president needs to stick to his commitment that it should be funded with private dollars.

TAPPER: All right. Representatives Russell Fry and Jared Moskowitz, thanks so much. Great to have you guys here.

The Justice Department is now responding after CNN confirmed reports that President Trump is personally pushing the Justice Department to subpoena the records of reporters who have covered the war in Iran and written stories he does not like. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:47:03]

TAPPER: In our politics lead, we have learned that the President Trump personally pushed the Justice Department to subpoena reporters covering the Iran War who have written stories he doesn't like.

At a recent meeting, Trump passed a stack of news articles that he and other senior administration officials deemed a national security risk. He passed these articles to his acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, with a sticky note on it that read "treason".

Two of the articles that Trump took issue with were published in "The Wall Street Journal" and "The New York Times". This all marks one of the most -- the administration's most aggressive attempts to root out leaks about national security.

My panel joins me now.

Mike Dubke, treason, he says.

MIKE DUBKE, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: Treason on a sticky note, on a sticky, no less, which I am quite familiar with. It's a good way to communicate in the West Wing. What do I think this is what I think. I think that there is frustration in the -- in the White House over the way this conflict has been progressing. And when you have frustration, you lash out at others to relieve yourself of some of that frustration.

I do think when the press crosses the line and that sometimes will happen, and leaking something that would put our service members in harms way, you do need to take some action. Bad stories, not so much. And that's probably what's happening right now. There's just a high level of frustration that this conflict that was supposed to end in four to six weeks, we're now on week 10.

TAPPER: Yeah. And just to note, I don't -- we don't know all the articles that he that he had in that stack with the treason sticky note. But the two that we do know, one of them was a very detailed piece about Netanyahu presenting the case for war in Iran and the administration being kind of skeptical about it, or some people in the administration being skeptical, not the president, but others. And the second one, I think, had to do with caveats and warnings that the president got.

As far as I could tell from the two articles we know about, there weren't any like state secrets or positions of troops or anything like that. It was about internal deliberations. Blanche posted on this story today on Twitter. He wrote, quote, "Prosecuting leakers who share our nations secrets with reporters, in turn risking our national security and the lives of our soldiers is a priority for this administration. Any witness, whether reporter or otherwise, who has information about these criminals, should not be surprised if they receive a subpoena about the illegal leaking of classified material."

KAREN FINNEY, FORMER SR. ADVISER, HILLARY CLINTON: Sure, but that's not what we're talking about here.

TAPPER: Right.

FINNEY: You know, they love to hide behind that. But, you know, look, a couple of things. Number one, freedom of the press. Pretty sure that's still in the Constitution. Trump hasn't taken to that yet as far as we know, although he is attacking anyone who he perceives doesn't absolutely love him and call him dear leader.

And it is offensive to this country that we have a president who spends more time going through articles and putting sticky notes to the attorney general -- let me finish, my dear -- than I don't know, lowering costs or getting us out of the war in Iran.

[18:50:05]

I mean, you mentioned they're frustrated. Guess what? American people are frustrated, too. And instead of writing on sticky notes, how about getting some work done.

DUBKE: On your last point, I was going to agree with you.

FINNEY: So okay. Here we go. Okay.

DUBKE: On the earlier point, I point out, Barack Obama had a very similar with Attorney General Holder. They went after reporters as well.

TAPPER: Well, let me, let me, let me -- let me say, because I talked about this a lot at the time, which is President Obama at the time used the espionage act more than any other previous president combined to go after leakers in his administration. And on occasion, that did mean forcing administration -- forcing journalists to testify, et cetera.

So, yes, but this potentially would be far more aggressive. And for different stories, not for --

FINNEY: Types of stories. Right here were talking about if, you know, he's like mad that people are mean to him because he's a terrible ruler, because he's doing a bad job. People get to write about that, and they get to write about the fact that the American people are frustrated and angry, and costs are going up. And I'm just suggesting that if he spent more time doing his job instead of that, he might be better in polls.

DUBKE: We should -- we should talk about that because, you know, with the midterms coming up and affordability being a very important issue, and the numbers that CNN had coming out today, I'm actually starting to get slightly worried when I see 70 percent --

TAPPER: Seventy percent disapprove.

DUBKE: Because that means Republicans have moved.

TAPPER: Yeah.

DUBKE: I've sat here before and I've go, look, this administration is going to feel fairly comfortable about the economy as long as the base stays there. And that means that you can't get above 65, 66, 67 percent. Now that we're in the 70s?

TAPPER: Yeah.

DUBKE: I mean, if we start to see multiple polls like that, that is worrying. TAPPER: And so we talked about what President Trump is doing instead

of addressing those issues head on in a sympathetic way and taking on policy positions. And look, there are policies he's pushed, but he doesn't talk about them.

But in terms of negotiating for prescription drugs, et cetera., but instead, this is what the President Trump, President Trump was doing last night. For example, after 10:30, we look at his truth social post.

In less than two hours, the 79-year-old man posted more than 50 times long standing grievances, reviving conspiracy theories, baseless accusations against some of his favorite targets, including President Obama. There was an A.I. image of J.B. Pritzker looking rather large and eating a lot, not taking into account the Ozempic that has -- he's shed 80 pounds from that. But in any case, that is not focused on the economy with a laser like intensity.

DUBKE: It's not. And that's unfortunate. And I will let you jump right into this. And that's what he should be talking about. You know, the Trump Savings Plans. He should be talking about TrumpRx.

I mean, all these things say Trump in them. So, they would be good things for him to be talking about. And he's not. And that's very frustrating. And I'm sure the two -- well, at least one of the congressmen you just had here was very frustrated with that as well.

FINNEY: Well, it's also not just about what he's not talking about. It's what he's not doing. I mean, the fact is we're not out of Iran. I'm sure any day now we're going to hear it's going to be two more weeks, because that's what I feel like we keep hearing. It's two more weeks. It's two more weeks. Gas prices are out of control.

I mean, the numbers say I don't have to go through the whole litany because the poll and polls consistently have been saying the exact same -- people are -- the house is on fire, and people feel like the president is MIA.

TAPPER: Here's the problem with the president trying to negotiate with the Iranians. Maybe the leaders of Iran -- of Iran don't care about their people if theyre willing to slaughter them for protesting for democracy, they don't care if inflation is 70 percent in that country.

FINNEY: But can I just -- there's something different, though. Also, the Iranians also, they don't have any reason to give Trump what he wants because they can wait him out. I mean, Trump --

DUBKE: They can't always wait him out. There is only limited areas for them to put more oil before they start -- they start shutting down.

And that's part of the game here. So, we can have a whole Iranian conversation. And I would love to get into that debate as well. But the thing that worried me today, and again, I think I'm just throwing up, you know, signal after signal that that CPI versus hourly wage graph that we saw the last time that happened, the second quarter, a year before the last presidential election. That's part of the reason Biden failed. That's part of the reason

Trump won. And now we're seeing that number, those lines cross again. And that's very troubling.

TAPPER: And just for people out there to translate, that means that wages can't keep up with inflation. That means that people are working harder and spending more. And you're right to be concerned about that. We're all concerned about that.

Mike, Karen, thanks to both of you.

What we're learning about all that data that was stolen when a company used by thousands of schools across the United States was hacked. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:59:01]

TAPPER: Our last leads start in our sports league. The NBA is suffering two losses today. The league says that Memphis Grizzlies forward Brandon Clarke has died at the age of 29. The Grizzlies said in a statement that Clarke was, quote, outstanding teammate and an even better person.

And then moments ago, we also learned that Jason Collins, the NBA's first openly gay player, died from brain cancer at the age of 47. His family said in a statement that Collins, quote, "changed lives in unexpected ways and was an inspiration to all who knew him and to those who admired him from afar," unquote.

Our thoughts go out to Jason and to Brandon's families and friends. May their memories be a blessing.

In our national lead, a follow up to a story we brought you last week. The data stolen in a hack that hit thousands of schools and universities has been returned, according to the company behind Canvas, which was the platform that was hacked.

The hackers previously threatened to release information about students and teachers if a ransom was not paid.

You can follow me on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky and on TikTok @jaketapper. You can follow the show on X and Instagram @TheLeadCNN. If you ever miss an episode of the lead, you can watch the show on the CNN app.

"ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT" anchored by our good friend Erin Burnett, starts right now. See you tomorrow.