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New Report on Home Buying; The Onion Wins Bid for Infowars; Senior Commanders React to Cabinet Picks. Aired 9:30-10a ET

Aired November 14, 2024 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:30:00]

PAUL BEGALA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Trump will submit him without an FBI background check. Why? Because of what that source told our reporter. He wants - not just to disrupt, he wants to insult the Senate. It's like - it is. It's Caligula in the - like the year 38, appointed Incitatus, his horse, council of Rome, in part because he wanted to show contempt for the senate. This - this American Caligula wants to show contempt for the U.S. Senate.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: I cannot believe that Caligula has come up twice in two hours, but there we are.

Let's talk about another controversial pick, Tulsi Gabbard, nominated to be Director of National Intelligence. She is someone who has spread Russian propaganda. She has questioned the intelligence, you know, of whether or not chemical weapons were used in Syria and visited on a secret trip to see the Syrian president.

Just, of - why her? I mean when you look at her background and what - some of the things she's said, Shermichael, there are serious worries that she could be a danger to the national security of this country. What do you think?

SHERMICHAEL SINGLETON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, look, she's a veteran. She's going to have to go through a background check as all nominees will have to go through. She'll go through a committee hearing. And if confirmed, then she'll go to the entire Senate. I mean that's just the process. And I think the president-elect, you know, has the right to nominate whomever he wants. And whether or not they're confirmed, you know, sometimes you confirm folks, sometimes you don't.

But I think, more importantly, why he probably went with the former congressman, Sara, she's very anti-war. And Trump has been someone, even when he was president before, he's very skeptical of the United States getting sort of bogged down in these prolonged, protracted, expensive and lengthy conflicts across the globe. And so I think he's probably looking at her as more of someone who has a foreign policy perspective that's probably very similar to his in terms of how much engagement we should be in, in terms of some of these conflicts we're currently seeing. And so I think it's more about that and less about some of the concerns that some folks on the left may raise about her background.

But again, she's gong to go through a background check. And if she's passed - you know, if she passes, then she'll be confirmed.

SIDNER: I see you wagging your head there, Paul, but let me just quickly play this -

BEGALA: I'm telling you, he - he has -

SIDNER: Let me quickly play this from national security - former National Security Adviser John Bolton, who talked to our Kate Bolduan about these picks, particularly Tulsi Gabbard, but also Gaetz.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BOLTON, FORMER NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER UNDER PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, I thought it was the worst cabinet level appointment in history until I then heard about the Matt Gaetz appointment.

Now we're going to see whether the American Senate can stand up and reject two people who are totally unqualified, unfit professionally, and really lacking in the moral characteristics, the character that you need to hold these jobs. I think this vote should be 100 to nothing against both of them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: Paul, do you see that happening?

BEGALA: No. No. I'm not sure there's going to be a vote. He will - he - if the - if it looks like he doesn't have the votes in, he'll get them from these Republicans. He'll put in a recess appointment.

And I want to - I hope Shermichael is right, there always has been a background check from the FBI. I don't think there will be this time. Why am I so sure? Well, if you read the tea leaves carefully, they've hinted at that from Trump land.

Second, it's already been done. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse released a six-year study of how the FBI followed up on tips of allegations against Brett Kavanagh when he was Trump's nominee for the Supreme Court. And you ought to read Senator Whitehouse's report. He says the tip line the FBI set up, all the tips, they didn't go to the FBI. Trump had them diverted them to the White House. So the White House was being tipped off to what the evidence was and who the accusers were.

It's - so, this guy is going to politicize the FBI, he's going to take them out of the confirmation process. He's going to take the Senate out of the confirmation process. And maybe that's why some of his closest aides in his first term use the word fascist about him now.

SIDNER: Wow. Paul, we are going to leave it there with your prediction and we'll see what happens.

SINGLETON: (INAUDIBLE). SIDNER: Shermichael, we are out of time, but both of you did get quite a bit of time to chat.

Thank you both.

Kate.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: And f-ing nightmare. Not talking about what we were just - what - about that. Let me just make this clear. I love what we do all day long. But it is an f-ing nightmare is the quote I'm reading. Ridiculous. Totally unqualified. That's some of the new reaction coming in from former and current senior military officers on some of who Donald Trump - some of who Donald Trump wants to be in his cabinet.

And we have just learned that satirical news site, The Onion, has won the bankruptcy auction to take control of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones' Infowars. Seriously.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:39:12]

SIDNER: The American dream of owning your own home seems to be getting further away for a heck of a lot of Americans. A new report shows if you want to buy a home now, you're going to need some serious cash, or make some serious money.

CNN's Matt Egan is with us now.

Just how much are we talking about here?

MATT EGAN, CNN REPORTER: Sara, six figures. This new report finds that the household income needs to be $108,000 a year in order to afford a new, single-family home and pay for home insurance and taxes.

Look at this. This is double, almost double what it was before Covid.

SIDNER: Crazy.

EGAN: Now, of course the problem is that not only have home prices gone up, but mortgage rates have, too. And home insurance, especially in some of those hard-hit hurricane areas. Now, people are making more money, but often not enough.

[09:40:01]

This report finds that just about one in three, 36 percent of households make enough money to afford to buy that new home and pay for the insurance and the taxes. That is down significantly from 59 percent before Covid. This is why it feels like the American dream is out of reach for far too many people.

When we look at the map, you can see that the least affordable markets are some of the ones you would suspect on the coast -

SIDNER: Yes.

EGAN: L.A., San Francisco, San Diego -

SIDNER: New York.

EGAN: Boston, New York.

Now, in all of these cities, you need household income above $200,000 a year to afford a home, led by San Jose, where you need to make $460,000 a year.

Now, President-elect Trump, he's talked about this issue on the campaign trail. He's laid out a number of ideas, cutting red tape, tax incentives to build more homes. He's talked about keeping mortgage rates low. Of course, that's not up to the president. That's up to the bond market and rates have actually been going up -

SIDNER: (INAUDIBLE).

EGAN: Because of some concerns about inflationary elements of the Trump agenda.

One last point. He's talked about mass deportations to curb demand. But we know that one in four construction workers are undocumented. And so if you lose workers, you're going to either have to pay the existing ones more or you're not going to be able to build as many homes. Either way, prices will go even higher.

SIDNER: That's a quarter of those folks that build the houses that we are so desperately in need of.

EGAN: It is.

SIDNER: Matt Egan, thank you so much for spelling that out for us.

EGAN: Thank you, Sara.

SIDNER: Kate.

BOLDUAN: And this just in, the satirical news website, The Onion, has won the bankruptcy option to buy conspiracy theorist Alex Jones' Infowars. Now, the bid was backed by families of the victims of the Sandy Hook massacre. The group won a one - one in - won a - won a huge billion-dollar lawsuit against Alex Jones and his company in 2018. This was over him spreading baseless, horrible conspiracy theories about the Sandy Hook massacre. Even saying that the shooting never happened and that it was made up.

According to reports coming in now, The Onion plans to turn Infowars potentially into a parody itself. But there's a whole lot of questions of what this means now with this news coming in.

So, let me bring in right now CNN media analyst and "Axios" senior media correspondent Sara Fischer on this.

Sara, tell me more about what you're hearing as we're learning, The Onion won this bidding war for Infowars. What could The Onion do with it?

SARA FISCHER, CNN MEDIA ANALYST: Well, the great thing, Kate, is that The Onion can do absolutely anything it wants at this point because it's independent. The Onion was part of a bigger media company that was owned by a private equity firm. And as such, a lot of its investments really had to go through its parent company. Now that it's independent, it can make acquisitions like this and it can do whatever it wants to the site. It owns the IP.

And you'll recall, when Alex Jones, today, talking to his listeners, was talking about what's going on, he said they've seized my equipment, they've seized parts of my studio. So The Onion could theoretically take his equipment and start broadcasting however they like. Of course, you should imagine, Kate, that they're going to do a lot with rebranding it, I assume, and trying to make it the parody that sort of fits its mold.

BOLDUAN: Hadas Gold has been - she was on just this week talking about this, and before the outcome had been known, in saying that no matter the outcome of this auction, Alex Jones had the option - you know, he could sadly continue to push his conspiracy theories by jumping over to another site, potentially. But can Alex Jones fight this?

FISCHER: It would be really hard for him to fight it. Remember, the bankruptcy judge is approving this process because he owes $1.5 billion to these families. Now, the only thing that he could have done prior to this would have been, get another ideologically aligned player to come up with the money to join the bidding process and try and get it sold to someone that was ideologically allied with him. That didn't happen.

So, I think Alex Jones is out of options. All he can do is complain about it. He can try to create a rival site, especially now that he's back on X. He has more of a platform and a megaphone to do that.

But it's going to be really hard, Kate. I mean he's built up this brand over so many years and I think it's going to be torturous for him to watch The Onion make a parody of it.

BOLDUAN: But when you think about the torture that these families have suffered from his conspiracy theories, I mean remind folks, Sara, of just what Alex Jones has done and how he has utilized Infowars to spread his conspiracy theories for so long.

FISCHER: Alex Jones is one of the most prolific conspiracy theorists in the United States, period, Kate. So, this is somebody who alleged that the U.S. government plotted 9/11. This is somebody who made the lives of these families of Sandy Hook victims absolute hell by spewing conspiracies about them for years. Most tech platforms kicked him off because they thought that he was just too toxic to the environment.

[09:45:01]

And so when he - when the judge says that he owes that - those families $1.5 billion, one thing I should note, Kate, in pulling - helping to pull together this bid, they're going to use some of what those proceedings would have gone to them to push this site against him. And it gives you a sense of how much the Sandy Hook families want to make sure that he gets a taste of his own medicine.

BOLDUAN: That's a great point.

Sara Fischer, thank you so much. You have some great, new reporting up on "Axios" this morning. Everyone should look at it.

Thank you so much, Sara.

John.

BERMAN: All right, this weekend, CNN has new back-to-back episodes of the original series, "How it Really Happened." They follow the mysterious deaths of seven people who were poisoned by cyanide-laced Tylenol in 1982. The investigation that followed forever changed the way medications and other goods are packaged.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: After a week of chaos and frenzied investigatory efforts, investigators got an interesting, new lead.

ON SCREEN TEXT: October 6th, 1982. Letters arrive at two locations: One to the White house addressed to President Reagan, and another sent to Johnson & Johnson demanding $1 million from the company.

JEREMY MARGOLIS, FORMER ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY, NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS: The author of the letters claimed to be the Tylenol killer.

WENDI FRIEDMAN TUSH, FORMER CORRESPONDENT, CNN: He writes, he doesn't like President Reagan's proposed tax laws and he writes a letter to President Reagan saying, you heard about those Tylenol killings. Well, I have lots of airline tickets. I can go other places and do this. But I won't do that if you change the tax laws.

CHUCK GOUDIE, CHIEF INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER, WLS-TV CHICAGO: And the letter to Johnson & Johnson demanded $1 million to stop the killings.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: "How It Really Happened" airs Sunday night at 9:00 Eastern and Pacific only on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:51:10]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEH JOHNSON, FORMER HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY UNDER PRESIDENT OBAMA: In the 50 years I've been observing American politics, this nominee is probably the least qualified I've ever seen for the position nominated. I - when I first saw the news, I thought it was a Russian hoax, or a joke.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: That is former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson speaking with Sara just last hour. Who is - who they - who he is talking about there, Donald Trump's pick to be the next attorney general of the United States, Matt Gaetz. Other current and former senior military commanders are reacting in the same way. One calling Trump's staffing choices right now a, quote, "f-ing nightmare."

That is some of the new reporting coming in from my colleague Jim Sciutto, who joins us now.

Jim, what are you hearing from your sources?

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Listen, alarm. And, by the way, this is not personal, when I speak to these sources. They don't have personal issues with many of these candidates. It goes to what their intentions are and what their qualifications are.

And I spoke to senior military commanders, both current and former, who have served both Biden and Trump, so served under both administrations. And, yes, the most colorful, you mentioned, Kate, one describing it as an f-ing nightmare. Another one described these appointments to me, particularly with the DOD in mind, as ridiculous.

But I want to highlight one that stood out to me because this is one that relates to all the appointments. And it's about loyalty. This from a recently retired four-star general who said, "the common denominator with these appointments is clearly loyalty. And while some loyalty is essential, slavish fealty is dangerous. Looking at all the announcements today, we could end up with one mind controlling many hands and I've never believed that one mind, any mind does that as well as diversity of thought."

And I think the other point I would highlight, Kate, is when you look at these appointments, right, it's not just personality issues. The folks involved have a fundamentally different view, many of them, of the very functioning of the agencies they've been selected to lead, and the intention to deliver on some of Trump's more extreme positions.

Pete Hegseth at State, it's not only that he was a Fox News host, right? He oppose women in combat. He has identified one-third of senior military commanders as being somehow too woke for the DOD and deserving of removal. And is quite a public proponent of the America first agenda, which would upend U.S. relationships with its allies and adversaries, right?

Tulsi Gabbard is someone who blamed Biden and NATO for Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and has said that Bashir al-Assad, you know, the slaughter of many thousands of his own people in Syria, and an ally of Putin, is not the enemy of the U.S., right?

So, the folks involved have quite different views and you would expect them to deliver on those views if they were to get these positions.

BOLDUAN: And to - add it altogether, Jim. What are you hearing could be - just speak in the near-term impact on U.S. foreign policy.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

Well, let's look at foreign policy in Ukraine. Many folks I speak to, both current and folks who served in the previous Trump administration believe that Trump will end U.S. military assistance to Ukraine and force Ukraine's hand to accept more than it wants to, to get some sort of peace with Russia, and that means land, giving up significant portions of its land. They do not believe that Donald Trump will do what President Biden did, which is to say that the U.S. would defend Taiwan militarily if China were to invade. How does China read that. Does it read that as a green light? Potentially. You know, that has real consequences.

And then - then the questions become, what does this mean for U.S. alliances abroad? Because as you know, Kate, you and I have talked about this, Donald Trump has often expressed skeptical views of the U.S. role in NATO.

[09:55:02]

There are genuine concerns that if he doesn't withdrawal he would significantly weaken U.S. commitment to NATO, but also other alliances with South Korea, Japan. I mean these have real consequences. They're not just theoretical things. And he's putting people in these positions who, it seems, he could count on to deliver on these positions.

BOLDUAN: Jim, it's good to see you. Thank you so much. (INAUDIBLE).

SCIUTTO: Good to see you too.

BOLDUAN: John.

BERMAN: All right, you've waited a long time for this. Authorities in Los Angeles have arrested four people for faking a bear attack to get insurance money. The suspects gave video to an insurance company claiming to show a bear opening the door of a Rolls-Royce and damaging the vehicle. But really the company says the bear was someone dressed in a bear suit. Authorities -

BOLDUAN: (INAUDIBLE).

BERMAN: Authorities say the suspects used the same scheme in two other incidents netting $140,000.

SIDNER: They had a Rolls-Royce but they needed money from the insurance - I'm confused. Could they not just sell it. OK. You know what - or not.

BERMAN: That's a good - that's a good point. That's a good point.

SIDNER: Or not.

BOLDUAN: Maybe it's a very expensive bear suit and so you just got to - BERMAN: Also a good point.

SIDNER: Was it, though, John? He's keeping us both happy.

BOLDUAN: No, he's trying to keep his job right now.

BERMAN: You guys are all both right. Everyone's right.

SIDNER: Thank you so much for joining us. Yes, that's - we're going to leave you with this. You're welcome.

BOLDUAN: Real claws.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)