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Biggest Tech Executives Take Center Stage at Trump's Inauguration; Rep. Pete Sessions, Co-Chair Of DOGE Caucus, Discusses New Department; Trump Targets Security Clearances, Energy Resources, Landmarks. Aired 2:30-3p ET
Aired January 21, 2025 - 14:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[14:30:00]
BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST: -- President Trump after January 6th.
But now this is a rational business choice that Mark Zuckerberg and others are making. They're sitting on really high hot stock. They want to keep their valuations high. They're doing what they believe is the cost of doing business by showing up at the inauguration.
But what else will Trump demand of them? That's the question going forward.
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: TBD.
Brian Stelter, thanks so much for the update.
Donald Trump's effort to make government more efficient is hitting its first roadblock -- lawsuits, three of them and counting. Ahead, why the so-called DOGE is now being targeted for those lawsuits.
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[14:34:59]
KAYLA TAUSCHE, CNN HOST: The Trump administration's new Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, is already facing legal challenges. A number of groups, including some that represent veterans and federal employees, have filed at least three separate lawsuits.
And they all make a similar allegation, that DOGE violates a federal act mandating transparency and ideological balance for any committee charged with advising a president or agencies.
Joining me now is the co-chair of the DOGE Caucus, Republican Congressman Pete Sessions of Texas.
For that caucus, DOGE stands for delivering outstanding government efficiency.
Congressman, it's good to see you.
I'd love to start with the president's executive order itself, which caused some head scratching when it said that the purpose of DOGE, the agency, is to upgrade government I.T. systems. Does that change the mandate at all in your mind?
REP. PETE SESSIONS (R-TX) & CO-CHAIR, DOGE CAUCUS: No. I don't think it does.
But it's certainly a basis for us to understand that if we're going to have federal employees that need to access data, then they need to have the most reliable, the most cost effective and, the most important part of all, interoperability among these databases that are huge.
So I think it makes perfect sense to a person. I came after 16 years of AT&T. We needed to make sure our employees had access to good technology and proper technology is also computers.
TAUSCHE: Your caucus has been meeting regularly to discuss what to cut and how. I'm curious if any specific ideas have gained steam and whether there are any sacred cows or non-negotiables for you.
SESSIONS: Well, in fact, these are questions that we ask ourselves. Where do we start? What's the most important? And how are we going to move together?
DOGE, here on the Hill, is a bipartisan opportunity that every single member of Congress, including the House and the Senate, has extended a chance for people to join in and to talk about government efficiency.
From our perspectives, the federal government has a lot of inefficiencies. By the way, not just that they operate, but to -- by the -- by the rules and regulations that they have that do not sustain programs, and make it difficult for the government to actually achieve their job and to do it in a way that serves the American people.
We believe that one of the most important things is for every government agency to have their employees report back to work, because we're going to be making determinations, as every administration should, about the right size, how many employees, the workload and the work that needs to be done.
As a result of people being home, not reporting to work every day, there are lots of government reports that say they're wholly efficient but, in fact, they still have huge problems --
(CROSSTALK)
SESSIONS: -- and government efficiency will address those.
TAUSCHE: Some of those changes have already been made by some of these executive orders.
But I'm wondering, when it comes to entitlement programs, if you see any changes to those as possible. And also curious about the coordination between what your caucus is doing and now what will appear to be a formal DOGE operation inside the federal government, not an outside advisory group? SESSIONS: Well, this is an interesting way to look at it. What we're
doing is allowing every single member to look at their idea of agencies or processes that are not efficient.
We had a work session last week with the United States Senate. There are people in the Senate that are responsible. They have held hearings just like we have.
I am the subcommittee chairman for government operations. And we have, for a long time, known that there is $1.7 trillion worth of waste, fraud and abuse that happens every few years.
When you combine that, it is an embarrassment to the taxpayer of this country and taking away from goods and services that could be given to people who deserve it most.
TAUSCHE: Of course, the --
SESSIONS: Waste, fraud and --
TAUSCHE: Of course, the estimated --
SESSIONS: Waste, fraud and abuse is something we've got to get after.
TAUSCHE: The range of what this DOGE group will target has shifted a little bit from $2 trillion to $1 trillion. And then there was a "Wall Street Journal" op-ed that suggested perhaps only $500 billion.
But I want to ask you, Congressman, about Elon Musk. Now, he will be the sole figurehead atop this group. He has a White House pass. He has an office near the president's.
And I'm curious if you have any concerns about his personal conflicts of interest, given all of the businesses that he runs?
[14:39:59]
SESSIONS: Well, I have no doubt that Elon Musk is an expert among experts at understanding not just organizational efficiencies, but better ways in which services can be provided.
He has invested billions of his own dollars and has millions of him -- or tens of thousands of employees, and he has made his organization spectacular.
We believe that the federal government has an opportunity to help themselves. And I think that I have very few qualms with him advising, whispering in the ear, perhaps, of the president, but helping us to sell the inefficiencies.
He takes a huge viewpoint of making sure we are challenged, and I think that's good.
TAUSCHE: Well, hopefully, you will come back as your work and their work continues.
We appreciate your time today. Congressman Pete Sessions, thank you.
SESSIONS: Thank you.
TAUSCHE: Ahead on CNN NEWS CENTRAL, President Trump is wielding his power in truly unprecedented ways. We'll look at the historic pace he is setting with his executive orders, and why they could even change how the White House operates.
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[14:45:27]
SANCHEZ: President Trump has already signed more than two dozen executive orders, and he is expected to add to that number today. Many of them target immigration. Others roll back his predecessors policies.
Let's get a closer look with CNN's Tom Foreman. He's tracking those that might be flying under the radar right now.
Tom, there is a big one impacting folks inside the White House. Tell us about that.
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it has to do with security clearances. Basically, what they have said is they want to give top secret, sensitive compartmented information security clearances to White House staff without background checks, typically conducted by the FBI, by the intelligence community.
Basically, what they've said is we think it takes too long to do it that way. We want to farm some of it out to private contractors. We just want to say we're giving it to some people.
The president is in his right to do this, but there are a lot of questions about it.
The FBI, for example, says background checks are designated to allow the government to assess whether a candidate is sufficiently trustworthy to be granted access to classified information.
What is a check normally like? You're looking at credit and criminal history, verification of citizenship, birth, education, employment, military history, interviews with people who know them, to know a little bit about the person.
Why do you want to do all this? You want to do all this so that a foreign actor or a criminal organization can't come in and say, hey, Bob, who works for the White House, we know that you committed a crime, that you were involved in an affair, and then they have leverage to force that person to do what they want.
The Trump administration is essentially saying we're more worried about the Deep State and the potential political fallout of finding bad things. Trust us, we know our people.
SANCHEZ: I remember during the first Trump administration, I was working at the White House and there was an official who had their security clearance revoked, reportedly over some online gambling that they had done.
FOREMAN: Right.
SANCHEZ: So that that is a fascinating one.
FOREMAN: Right.
SANCHEZ: The president has also declared a national emergency at the southern border, but he did the same thing with American energy.
FOREMAN: Interesting question. Why would you say there is an energy emergency? Well, the White House is saying because, basically, gas prices are too high.
And they have been high. They've been high and they've come down some. They're not the highest, but they're still fairly high.
What made that happen? A combination of the pandemic and Russia invading Ukraine and Russian oil being pulled back.
But that's -- the idea behind this is he wants to open Alaska wilderness to more oil and gas drilling. You keep hearing Republicans say again and again, drill, baby drill, baby, drill.
But people in the oil and gas industry have largely said, you know, we're the biggest producer in the world right now. And market forces will determine if we produce more. You can change the law. That's not going to make us drill, necessarily.
SANCHEZ: We're already drilling a whole lot.
FOREMAN: Yes, yes.
And one of the other things that they've done, which is really -- it's just one of these things that I think, for those who like it, they think it's great. For those who don't, it just makes them shake their head.
They want to change the name of Denali, up in Alaska, back to Mount McKinley, named for President McKinley, who was assassinated in 1901, 25th president.
I think they want to change it back to Mount McKinley, a guy who never even went to Alaska. It was named this because a prospector there for gold, you know, liked McKinley and thought McKinley would push the gold standard. That's how the name came.
This is more in keeping with the long, long history of that area and people who -- the people who live there before the U.S. had a claim there.
And of course, wants to change the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. Kind of a difficult thing to do, because these are international waters. Even if the U.S. does it, it doesn't mean the world or cartographers will go along.
SANCHEZ: I wonder how we'll approach it here at CNN once they change it --
(CROSSTALK)
FOREMAN: I have wondered --
SANCHEZ: With a global standard, with the U.S. standard, is it like metric?
(CROSSTALK)
FOREMAN: And if you choose one --
SANCHEZ: Or metric that --
(CROSSTALK)
FOREMAN: -- does that somehow imply a political choice?
SANCHEZ: Yes. Yes.
FOREMAN: And I've been in parts of the world where that's exactly what happens.
If you call the town this name, it means one thing. If you call it the other name, it means something else. And you're making a political choice just because you choose a name.
SANCHEZ: These are the questions that keep Tom Foreman up at night.
FOREMAN: It does.
SANCHEZ: Tom, it's been called this for 400 years.
Appreciate your reporting. Thanks so much, Tom.
[14:49:30]
Still to come, freedom for two Americans held by the Taliban. A final but significant achievement for former President Biden. We're going to tell you how this deal came about in just a few minutes.
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SANCHEZ: We are now getting the first images of one of the Americans released in a prisoner exchange deal brokered in the final hours of the Biden administration.
TAUSCHE: William McEntee and Ryan Corbett, seen here on the left, were released by the Taliban just hours after President Trump returned to the White House.
CNN's Alex Marquardt is here.
Alex, officials are citing weather delays, but you're learning there could be more at play here.
ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: There was weather, bad weather in both Washington and Kabul. And that, I'm told, did play into some of the delay.
But more specifically, I was also told the Taliban, which has been pretty intransigent for the past two years as the Biden administration has tried to get Corbett, McEntee and other Americans out, actually wanted to please and give the credit to the Trump administration. So that's why I'm told that delay happened.
You can see in that picture there on the right is Roger Carstens. That is Biden's special envoy for hostage affairs. He does not have a role, at least not yet, in the Trump administration. So he was technically already off the clock when this -- this trade went down.
[14:55:04]
This was a long time in the making. The Biden administration has been trying to get these two American men and at least two other American men out of Taliban custody for some two years now.
We don't know much about McEntee. This was not a name we were tracking. Ryan Corbett, we -- we know his story quite well.
He and his family, including three kids, they were actually living in Afghanistan for more than a decade before the before Afghanistan fell to the Taliban back in 2021. He returned to Afghanistan in 2022. That's when he was detained.
So certainly, the pressure of the Trump administration coming in -- and this was acknowledged by a senior Biden administration official I spoke with -- added pressure to the Taliban.
Of course, now the Trump administration will pick up this effort to try to get at least these two others, George Glassman and Mahmoud Habibi, out. There could be other Americans as well.
Of course, we have heard President Trump speak often about his desire to -- to get Americans home.
TAUSCHE: And he will have a new special envoy for hostage affairs who will be leading that charge as well.
Alex, thank you. Alex Marquardt.
Making good on his promises. After a day where President Trump pardoned over a thousand January 6th rioters, what other parts of his agenda will he look to carry out? We'll discuss that after this quick break.
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