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Trump Meets With NC families Affected By Hurricane Helene; Trump Says He's Considering Getting Rid Of FEMA; ICE: Hundreds Of Undocumented Immigrants Arrested This Week. Aired 2-2:30p ET
Aired January 24, 2025 - 14:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[14:00:51]
ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: A presidential visit after campaign criticism. Donald Trump returning to disaster ravaged North Carolina and now making his way to Florida. After slamming the federal response to the flooding and the fires in two states and now suggesting he could try to eliminate FEMA altogether.
Pete Hegseth could be just hours away from learning his fate as the Senate is set to vote on Trump's controversial pick to lead the Pentagon.
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Plus, is dumping the penny a smart idea? Elon Musk's efficiency squad could be targeting the penny for history, a move that could save millions of dollars. We'll discuss as we follow these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN News Central.
HILL: Right now, President Trump on his way to tour the devastating wildfire damage in Los Angeles. He's heading there after spending some time in western North Carolina today where he surveyed the catastrophic impact of Hurricane Helene. The President also spoke with families who shared some of their stories and pleaded for more federal aid. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WOMAN #1: You know, we need help. I wrote a letter to send to Congress. You know, I don't understand what's going on. If we can't get FEMA help, then will you guys help us? Will you step up and be our fellow citizen? Will you step up and be our neighbor and send us something? Help us, help us get our community back. It's -- I could go on. It's just a, I don't know, it's just heartbreaking. I appreciate you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HILL: Well, CNN's Jeff Zeleny is live in Asheville, North Carolina. The President also spent a lot of time actually bashing his predecessor, talking about how upset he was with the response from the Biden administration initially. JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Erica that was one central part of the President's message here, pointing the blame to the previous administration. Of course, we are on the four month anniversary of the beginning of Hurricane Helene. Of course, it took a few more days for it to reach this part of western North Carolina.
But as you can see behind me here, this is just a small sliver of the damage that still remains as the recovery efforts are still underway. So the people on the ground aren't pointing blame at which party was in charge, who is responsible? Yes, there is criticism of FEMA from both sides. But President Trump, when he arrived here, he had a lot of blame for President Biden and he was clearly still on his mind. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
They haven't done the job because they weren't really told to do the job by Biden. I guess Biden was thinking about other things, wasn't he? But they weren't told what they did. What the past administration did to North Carolina is a disgrace.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ZELENY: So look, a familiar pattern of blame. But the reality is going forward, it is the governing and it is the responsibility of this administration, officials at the local, state and federal level to get the disaster assistance they need. And as the President, he just is flying out of California. Air Force One just took off a few moments ago.
And of course, that is a central question as well. Where is this disaster aid? How will it be funded? Will he be able to marshal a package through this narrowly divided House and Senate? That's a question here. But on a broader point, the President making it clear that he believes that FEMA has too big of a role and has called for the dismantling of FEMA. So that certainly would raise questions for disasters going forward.
FEMA has largely been one of those agencies where Republicans and Democrats alike have agreed to fund it, have happily funded it, because they know that the disaster areas can strike in red areas, in blue areas, politics do not matter. But it is one more part of what the Trump administration, as he ends his first work week here on this Friday, what the dismantling of the government could actually look like. And if FEMA was not around, actually, the woman who was asking for help might be asking for even more help. Erica?
[14:05:00]
HILL: Yeah, we heard similar from the mayor of Asheville just about an hour ago. Jeff, appreciate it. Boris.
SANCHEZ: We actually want to play for you some sound of how President Trump says he plans to drastically change the way Americans get their disaster relief. Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, 45TH AND 47TH U.S. PRESIDENT: I'll also be signing an executive order to begin the process of fundamentally reforming and overhauling FEMA, or maybe getting rid of FEMA. I think, frankly, FEMA is not good. I think when you have a problem like this, I think you want to go and whether it's a Democrat or Republican governor, you want to use your state to fix it and not waste time calling FEMA --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: Let's get some perspective now from former FEMA administrator Craig Fugate. He runs Craig Fugate Consulting. Sir, thanks so much for being with us. Obviously, Trump has been critical of FEMA, suggesting he may get rid of the agency altogether. What would that mean for places impacted by disasters?
CRAIG FUGATE, FORMER FEMA ADMINISTRATOR: Well, you know, I've seen this before. After Hurricane Katrina, Congress was going to abolish FEMA and reorganize it. Prior to Katrina, Homeland Security had actually taken FEMA part and it failed its mission.
So I think -- we've seen this before. The functions have to be done. How you do it is key. My recommendation if the President wants to reform FEMA, is get his new FEMA administrator confirmed and give them direction to make those reforms.
SANCHEZ: Do you think it would be efficient or even feasible to have states, as Trump put it, take care of disasters?
FUGATE: Well, we proposed this and actually got legislation after Sandy to begin that process of moving towards funding disasters in a way that would put the states back in charge of managing it. One of the things was that we would allow states to come up with what the estimates were. We would, you know, review that and make sure the numbers made sense and then write them a check and they could go rebuild it the way they wanted to.
That legislation has already been passed. But what's interesting is, and prior administrations, we've moved away from that. So again, my recommendation is get the new FEMA administrator appointed, give them clear direction, and then ask what can we do with the current authorities before we have to go back to Congress?
SANCHEZ: What were the counterarguments to that strategy? When you say that it moved back toward having FEMA more involved in designating where money was going to go, why did that happen?
FUGATE: Well, a lot of it was the states and locals were concerned that they may miss opportunities if FEMA offered a final payment up front. What if they discovered something later? Others, I think, even within the federal government were concerned about what the accountability would look like.
And this is, I think, the real crux of the matter. A lot of what FEMA deals with are regulations or policies and procedures because of prior findings from inspector general investigations of things that went wrong where states and local governments, in some cases, were not good stewards of the taxpayers money, in some cases actually ended up in criminal prosecutions.
So there's this tendency to say give them all the money, but then at the end of the day, who's going to be responsible for making sure the money was spent where it was supposed to be spent in a way consistent with the intent of Congress? Remember, these are your federal tax dollars.
SANCHEZ: Right.
FUGATE: And I think there's this simplification saying we can just give people money and trust them. However, Congress also wants accountability and that balance is where FEMA is often caught between the competing factions.
SANCHEZ: That's important perspective to keep in mind. I also wanted to get your thoughts, Craig, on Trump threatening to withhold federal aid to California unless the state adopts voter ID laws and changes its water policy. What's your reaction to that?
FUGATE: I think, you know, if you're going to tie FEMA dollars to states doing something different, I'd focus on the things we know work to reduce disaster costs of the taxpayers, like stronger building codes and land use planning. I mean, a lot of what we're seeing in states, whether it's a red or blue state, is where we've developed and built in areas that we didn't adapt to what's happened and we continue to see the losses grow.
So I'm not opposed to putting strings on that taxpayer's money as long as it's tied to things that will reduce the future cost of disasters by holding states and local governments more accountable for decisions they're making that in some cases continue to grow the risk.
SANCHEZ: That seems to make sense. Craig Fugate, appreciate your expertise as always.
FUGATE: Thanks for having me.
SANCHEZ: Erica.
HILL: Migrant communities are on edge as President Trump's mass deportation plan surges into action across the country. The mayor of Newark, New Jersey says that his city was, quote, unfairly targeted on Thursday when he says authorities arrested multiple people at a fish market. And he's accusing officials of not producing a warrant while detaining undocumented residents and U.S. citizens, among them a military veteran.
[14:10:07]
CNN has not been able to independently verify his claims. Agents, though, are making the rounds in Boston this week. Our affiliate, they're reporting several arrests across the city. Meantime, the White House says it is now using military planes to deport migrants. Officials from the White House sharing images of people lined up and handcuffed as they boarded a flight.
CNN's Natasha Bertrand joining us now live from the Pentagon with more on this. So, Natasha, in terms of the military role here, it is unusual to use a military plane.
NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: It is extremely unusual and it's something that the Pentagon in the past has been very reluctant to take part in in terms of sending soldiers and U.S. military personnel to engage in this kind of domestic enforcement activity.
But what we are seeing is that the White House has really been putting out a lot of imagery today of these deportation flights, of marines and soldiers operating at the border, really in an attempt to show and send a message here that the President is carrying out the exact kind of thing at the border that he promised to do, which is a very heavy handed message to anyone who is trying or planning to come across the border illegally.
This is very, very heavy on kind of military symbolism here. And the imagery that we're seeing of course, really underscores that. 2 C-17s and 2 C-130s military aircraft we're are now en route to prepare to take these migrants back to the countries where they came from. And we should note that these military aircraft, they're really not cheap. In fact, according to publicly available data, sending migrants back to these countries does cost quite a bit more using military aircraft than say, DHS aircraft which they had been using previously.
Just to get a sense there, you can see that a charter flight from the Department of Homeland Security from ICE costs about $8,500 per flight hour, whereas military transport aircraft can cost anywhere between $21,000-$71,000. That's just per hour. So if you take the estimated cost of these military flights, say from El Paso to Guatemala City, like the ones that we have seen over the last day or so, that can go up to $850,000 if they are using a C-130.
Now, the ones that we are seeing in photos, those were C-17s, those would be about $250,000, but still almost double what a charter flight on a DHS plane would actually cost. And so you can see how all of this is starting to add up and we should note that the Department of Defense anyway tells us that they have not actually started to calculate the costs themselves or determined where exactly they're going to pull that money from. Erica?
HILL: Which is fascinating given that there is also to be -- supposed to be a focus on cutting costs and overspending. Natasha, really appreciate it. It's some really important context for us. Thank you.
Also with us this our CNN's Valeria Leon, who is live in Ciudad Juarez, where Mexico is building temporary shelters now for deported migrants. So, Valeria, talk to us more about these shelters and how many people could ultimately end up there.
VALERIA LEON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, sure. So this is the place where the Mexican government is setting up one of the 25 temporary shelters along the U.S.-Mexico border to receive exclusively Mexican deportees. So this place just across the border city of El Paso, between El Paso and Ciudad Juarez in Mexico would be able to take in up to 2,000 migrants.
And right now, there are 250 people, according to local authorities, working round the clock to put this place together in the next two days. Here, the migrants will receive food and clothes, also a bed to sleep in and also medical services. But it's uncertain if this place would be enough to protect migrants from the cold, temperatures dropping below freezing at night.
And also in this border town of Ciudad Juarez, churches have expanded their spaces to provide shelter -- to give shelter and provide clothes and food to the migrants with canceled CBP One appointments that are now stranded on the U.S.-Mexico border.
HILL: So, Valeria, the Trump administration has said specifically that it is targeting criminals initially. Is there a concern if these are in fact people who've committed crimes who are now going to be sent to these 10 cities? Is there a security concern?
LEON: Well, the Mexican President, Claudia Sheinbaum, has insisted on giving a humanitarian treatment to the migrants, especially to the Mexican deportees.
[14:15:01]
So rather than talking about them or targeting them as criminals, the Mexican government has launched this program called Mexico Embraces You, which offers a hundred dollar debit card and also the possibility to transporting migrants and Mexican deportees to their hometowns within Mexico.
But yesterday at the international port between El Paso, Texas and Ciudad Juarez, a protest was held by a Mexican organization and they were protesting against mass deportations. So this protester said that they fear that this mass deportations will bring -- will represent like a major immigration crisis for Mexico. Erica?
HILL: Valeria, I really appreciate the reporting. Thank you. Boris? Oh no, this is still me. My apologies. Still to come here. Just hours from now, the Senate set to vote on whether to confirm Pete Hegseth as the Secretary of Defense. We know two Republicans have already said they will not vote for him. Could there be more?
Plus, as infernos continue to break out in Southern California, President Trump is now threatening to withhold disaster aid unless the state does two things.
And accused quadruple murderer, Bryan Kohberger, in court for a second day trying to get crucial evidence tossed out, evidence that could tie him to the killings of four University of Idaho students. Those stories and much more all ahead on CNN News Central.
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[14:21:09] HILL: Some breaking news coming into us here at CNN. We have learned Israel is now preparing to receive four female IDF soldiers being held hostage by Hamas, the group releasing the names of those hostages earlier. Bianna Golodryga joining us now with more on this. So, Bianna, good news that there are some names and there will be more hostages coming out, but this is maybe not what everyone was expecting.
BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: Yeah, it's been quite a stressful few hours here in Israel, Erica, and let me explain why Hamas released two mediators, a list of four names to be released tomorrow from Gaza.
The issue is these were not the names that Israel had been expecting on this second part of phase one, the release of 33 Israeli hostages. Israel had been expecting that there would be at least one of the two female civilian hostages that are expected in this first phase of the deal to be part of the four women release tomorrow. Instead, Hamas released a list of names of four IDF female spotters.
We should note that military service is mandatory here in Israel. There are four of these spotters now on the list out of five that remain in captivity in Gaza. And we have these names for you right now, Naama Levy, Liri Albag, Karina Ariev, and Daniella Gilboa. And given that this was not the list that Israel had been anticipating, there was a lot of trauma and concern here in the country as these names weren't made public yet.
These names were circulated, concern among the family members of those of the two female civilian hostages that are expected to be among the 33 released, namely that of Arbel Yehud, 29 years old, who was kidnapped from her Kibbutz on October 7, 2023. The other female civilian who is expected to be part of this 33 list release is Shiri Bibas, and of course, she is the mother of five-year-old Yarden Bibas and two-year-old Kfir Bibas.
Nonetheless, there is a collective sigh of relief here now that these names have been made public, especially from the families of these women. I've spent a lot of time talking to these mothers, talking to these families, getting to know them over these last 15-and-a half arduous years.
Now that Israel has accepted this list, even though they say Hamas violated the terms, once these IDF spotters are in Israeli custody is when Israel will start releasing 50 Palestinian prisoners for each of these four IDF spotters. And they will also be starting to allow Palestinian residents to return to their homes in northern Gaza as well. Erica.
HILL: All right, Bianna, I really appreciate the update. Thank you. Boris
SANCHEZ: In just a few hours, the Senate is expected to vote on whether to confirm Pete Hegseth as the nation's 29th Defense Secretary. Right now, two Republican senators are opposing his nomination, but four in total are needed to defeat it. If Hegseth is confirmed, it would mean that his bid survived serious allegations of sexual misconduct, financial mismanagement and alcohol abuse, all of which he has denied.
The latest revelation is that Hegseth told the Senate Armed Services committee he paid $50,000 to a woman who accused him of sexual assault as part of a confidentiality agreement. He was never charged with a crime. He maintains that that incident was consensual, and his attorney says those claims are false.
Joining us now to discuss is Democratic Congressman Jason Crow of Colorado. He's a former Army Ranger and serves on the House Armed Services Committee. Congressman, thanks so much for being with us. It seems like Hegseth's confirmation is imminent. Your reaction?
REP. JASON CROW, (D) ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Yeah, it does seem like it's imminent, and I'm deeply troubled by that.
[14:25:00]
I have resisted his nomination since day one because the military is a leadership organization. There's nothing more important in the military than leadership. And I served three combat tours as an Army Ranger in Iraq and Afghanistan. And leadership at the core of that is character and integrity.
And these allegations of sexual abuse, alcohol abuse, financial mismanagement of nonprofits, it goes to the core of that. But what's more is his repeated assertions and statements over years that women are not qualified to serve in combat roles, women are not qualified in some cases to be in the military. And that just runs antithetical to everything I know about service.
SANCHEZ: Obviously, we mentioned your work on the Armed Services Committee. Do you see a space where you could work with a Secretary Hegseth to advance something? Is there common ground?
CROW: Well, I'm somebody that takes the view that when you have a mentality of, you know, all or nothing, my way or the highway, then nothing happens for anybody. And I don't believe that restores trust. I don't believe that serves our service members. So, yeah, I will try to find areas of common cause because that's what our service members deserve.
There are men and women who are standing up to serve, who are putting their lives on the line, who expect us to do our job to support them. And I will never stop doing my job to support them, even if that means finding ways to work with Secretary Hegseth. At the same time, I'm never going to stop calling out abuses when I see them and saying what I believe, which is pretty clear here. And I don't believe he should serve as the Secretary of Defense.
SANCHEZ: I want to get your thoughts on how the Trump administration is using military assets and military personnel to execute its vision when it comes to deportations, specifically the use of military aircraft. Administration officials released these images, I believe we have them, of a line of what are apparently undocumented people on getting ready to board a repatriation flight to Guatemala. And our understanding is that military aircraft was used to carry that out. We were speaking to an expert earlier who said that essentially this is not something new. I'm curious to get your reaction to the use of military aircraft to carry this out.
CROW: Well, the use of military for domestic law enforcement purposes is illegal in many instances. According to federal law, there are carve outs in certain scenarios. So as a member of the Armed Services Committee, I am going to conduct that oversight and make sure that our military personnel and equipment is not being used and abused in violation of the law.
You know, our service members, our men and women, stand up they raise their right hand like I have many times throughout my life, and they take an oath to defend our country against our adversaries, right? And these folks do not expect to be sitting doing border guard duty on the border.
It's not their highest and best use. It's actually not going to solve the problem. It's not going to deliver comprehensive immigration reform in a bipartisan way, which is ultimately what we need to have to solve this problem, not these large shows of force, which is going to waste taxpayer dollars.
SANCHEZ: To that point about reform. The Laken Riley Act is likely going to be the first piece of legislation that Donald Trump is going to sign in his second-term. There were some divisions among Democrats over whether to support or advance that bill. This is an issue that is seen as a liability for Democrats from the last election. I wonder if you think there is consensus within your party on immigration.
CROW: Well, what we need to do is actually explain what these bills do. You know, what I've learned in Congress is there's a lot of examples where something seems good on its face. And maybe the bill title is compelling, but when you actually look at what the bill does, in this instance, it allows federal immigration authorities to detain people who they suspect, who they think might be an illegal alien or someone without status, and then deport those individuals.
Listen, I represent one of the most diverse districts in this nation, a community of immigrants and refugees in Aurora, Colorado. This is a community of great strength because of these immigrants and refugees. And the idea that there are going to be ICE agents sweeping through my community and deciding who they think might be documented and undocumented and seizing families, seizing children is just something that I cannot tolerate.
SANCHEZ: That distinction that you just made in the Laken Riley Act, people that have been suspected versus people who have been adjudicated and processed and proven to be, whether thieves or some of these other things covered in the bill. Would you have supported the bill if it was more explicit when it came to who the person was? A convict rather than a suspect?
CROW: Yeah, I support elements of the bill that actually are already illegal, right? There's many things in the bill like deporting violent criminals. That's already against the law, and I support that. You know, I'm all about public safety. I'm all about protecting our families and protecting our children. That's been one of my priorities since day one in Congress.
And, you know, I don't -- I actually haven't talked to anybody. I haven't met anybody. Maybe they exist, but I haven't met them, who doesn't think that we shouldn't round up violent criminals and get them off of our streets and out of our communities.