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Court Rules U.S. Treasury Department Officials Affiliated with Department of Government Efficiency May Access Treasury Department Systems as Read Only; President Trump to Speak at National Prayer Breakfast; NTSB, FAA Investigators to Brief Lawmakers on Midair Collision. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired February 06, 2025 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: It sort of gives shivers down your spine that this is not completely contained and that it's sort of morphing and changing. Meg Tirrell, thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump set to speak just minutes from now on Capitol Hill, but he's already talking this morning on social media, making sure everyone knows he is serious about his Gaza proposal, even as his staff tries to walk it back.

And health officials are sounding alarm over a DEI watchlist, saying it's racist and plainly trying to threaten, intimidate, and scare.

And a wild boat rescue after a driver collapses. How rescuers jumped to action as the boat spun out of control to get the man some help.

I'm Kate Bolduan with Sara Sidner and John Berman. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, happening now, you're looking at live pictures from Capitol Hill. We are standing by to see President Trump deliver remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast. We will take that to you live the minute he begins.

Also, it is a strange and maybe pivotal day in Washington. It is the final day for federal workers to decide if they will take a buyout or offer to resign, or risk getting laid off.

And breaking overnight, there are new developments in the battle over whether Elon Musk's team should have access to sensitive data inside the Treasury Department. Let's get to CNN's Alayna Treene at the White House with that. What data? Who's got access? What's limited, what's not?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: Yes, there are a lot of questions about this, particularly some of the legality of what Elon Musk and his representatives at DOGE have been doing. And one of the questions was that some of his representatives, some of those representatives had gotten access to highly sensitive systems, payment systems, at the Treasury Department.

And then yesterday we saw there were emergency court proceedings to really look at the privacy concerns and issues around this. Now, what this new court filing and this court decided is that essentially two Treasury Department employees affiliated with DOGE are able to have access, but only limited access to the systems. And the Trump administration agreed to this. They've agreed to the limitation that these two Treasury employees can have, quote, "read only" access to the system. They also have agreed to not share it with others working with DOGE.

But look, just to take a quick step back here to explain what's happening with this. Over the past two weeks, John, we know that Musk's team has really tried to dismantle a lot of U.S. agencies. They've moved to gut hundreds of thousands of workers in the government and also try to cut the red tape, what they argue is federal bureaucracy bogging down the government. They're trying to kind of clean that out. And part of that is them going to these different agencies and gaining access to these highly sensitive systems to look for what they argue is waste, fraud, and abuse.

And it's not just happening at the Treasury Department. We've also learned that some people working with DOGE have gained access to the Centers for Medicaid (ph) and Medicaid Services. What we've learned is that these different representatives have been granted access to payment and contracting systems, but they have not yet received access to databases containing identifiable health information about Medicare and Medicaid employees.

Now, of course, we know that CMS, the Center for Medicaid (ph) and Medicaid Services, they have access and kind of oversee the health care coverage of more than 150 million people. So, again, very important data that they are gaining access to.

Now, we did see Elon Musk himself respond to some of this reporting. He weighed in on X. He said, quote, "Yes, this is where the big money fraud is happening," when one person shared the article from "The Wall Street Journal" on this story.

All to say, there are so many questions about the influence that Musk and also DOGE are having. We know that they are permeating all of government, and they also are very integral to what we are seeing with some of those buyouts and layoffs as well. So as this, all of this is happening, questions over the legality, questions over conflict of interests, all of that really rising to the surface, John.

BERMAN: It keeps on rising as well. Alayna Treene at the White House for us this morning. Great to have you there. Sara?

SIDNER: All right, let's continue the conversation. Joining me now, CNN political commentator and Democratic strategist Maria Cardona, and Maura Gillespie, founder and principal of Bluestack Strategies and former press advisor to then House Speaker John Boehner.

I'm going to start with you, Mara. We just heard from Alayna Treene some of the reporting about what is happening with DOGE, in particular, what's happening with Elon Musk.

[08:05:00]

Maura, when you talk to Republicans, are they concerned at all about the power that Musk is being given here?

MAURA GILLESPIE, FOUNDER AND PRINCIPAL BLUESTACK STRATEGIES: Yes. Federal Work is not necessarily always so glamorous, but there are concerns about how much we spend on federal funding and federal spending. And there's going to be abuses that happen. You know, we know stories from the government accountability office talking about how federal employees took advantage and abuses of the federal health plans.

But by and large, to make such swift changes from someone who is not an elected official and who has now gained access, I think that Republicans, if roles were reversed, would be screaming from the rooftops what a breach this is and a breach of security and safety and a violation of what Congress does. There's a separation of powers for a reason. Congress has the power of the purse, and they're letting someone who has really paid his way in to take advantage of that. And I think that there should be some real concerns. And there probably are behind the scenes. But I think in a lot of ways Republicans are trying to let the president take the lead here and hope that he will step up at some point.

SIDNER: Look, Maria, the president won, you know, the election. And during his campaigning, he said there was going to be retribution. He also said he was going to fix the economy. He has certainly started and is making his promise come true about retribution first. I mean, what are Democrats to do here? They are not in power in the House or the Senate. What is the messaging, or what do they need to do to try and rein some of this power in, if they can?

MARIA CARDONA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: So Democrats are really starting to underscore that exact same message, Sara. Look, we saw that Donald Trump got the trust of voters when he told them that he would fix the economy, he would continue to bring down inflation, and he would decrease the price of gasoline, rent, and groceries. He has done everything but that. Yes, he talked about retribution. Yes, he talked about mass deportations. But for the most part, we see from polls that the voters who are not MAGA trusted him to focus on the economy first.

And so Democrats are going to talk about how everything that he has done thus far has been a huge betrayal of the American people, because he has not kept that promise. And we all know that the economy was number one issue for most voters.

Now, in addition to that, we're also going to focus, and you've already seen Democrats talking about this. You had senators at Treasury yesterday. You had members of Congress and USAID really focusing on the massive overreach of unelected, unconfirmed, unqualified, unaccountable people like Elon Musk and his Stepford minions that are going in and literally stealing privacy, private information from Americans. And I've heard that a lot of offices, including Republicans, are starting to get very concerned phone calls from their voters, as they should.

So that's what a lot of Democrats are going to start talking about. They're going to start being very loud about this. You have Democratic A.G.s that have also gone to court. That's why you see a lot of the restraining orders on things like birthright citizenship, on things like having access to all this privacy data. So there is so much coming at us, Sara, but Democrats are going to start getting very loud and very focused on the massive betrayal of the American people by this president.

SIDNER: Maura, I do want to ask you about the FBI forced to hand over thousands of names of agents whose job it was to work on the January 6th cases. But just quickly, this is President Trump. He was expected a bit earlier, but he is now entering to go to the prayer breakfast, and we will take his comments in just a bit here. After there has been so much controversy here about some of the things he has said, there are a lot of people listening and watching to see what he says today. I do want to quickly talk about it, and we will have breaking in once he starts speaking.

But one of the one of the things that we are seeing here is FBI agents having to sort of fight for their jobs. And the CIA putting out the list that was demanded by Donald Trump of new hires at the CIA. It was not in a classified document. I mean, why should another country work with us when they see that the U.S. might be willing to expose their own people and put them potentially in danger?

GILLESPIE: You know, I Think the question is more about what should we as Americans be thinking if our government is willing to put our own people at risk like this? Separate that from our allies and what their concern should be, but I think as American voters, we should be concerned about what this means for us and our safety. And for anyone who is looking to enter public service, again, it's not as though people are banging down the doors to be part of the government, to be part of the civil service.

[08:10:02]

Like I said before, it's not necessarily the most glamorous job in the world. But unfortunately, we have a shortage. We see that with Capitol police. We see that with across the board. And so I worry about what this says. And why would anyone want to then entice themselves to take a position if they know that their safety and security would be at risk if their names are being exposed and their families could be at risk? It's a concern, just, I think for, again, for Republicans at large who voted for Donald Trump. Yes, you want accountability. Yes, you want transparency. But one of the number one things that people voted for in addition to the economy was safety and security. This isn't that.

SIDNER: Maria, I do want to ask you about Project 2025. There was a lot of distancing himself from Project 2025, Donald Trump, and now we're hearing him say he wants to close the Department of Education, which was one of the huge tenants of project 2025. Isn't he using it as a playbook now? CARDONA: No question about that, Sara. And that is something that

Democrats tried to scream from the rooftops that the second Trump administration has a playbook, and it was called Project 2025. And what we are seeing now is he is going down the list of what Project 2025 laid out, and he is checking the boxes methodically. We are seeing it every single day with every executive order.

And I think what Americans need to understand, and again, going back to the Democratic message, this is something that Democrats are going to underscore, this is putting Americans lives and livelihoods at risk. Literally, people are going to die, if they haven't started dying already, not just around the globe, but even in this country. When you hollow out agencies, planes will fall out of the sky. People will not get their payment. People who are at risk, who are low income, are not going to get the food they need, are not going to get the medicines they need.

Around the world, we are pushing our allies into the arms of China and Russia. China and Russia are salivating at every single move that this president is making. To Maura's point, this is not just not focusing on the economy, betraying what he told the American people, but this is putting our lives and livelihoods at risk and in danger.

SIDNER: Maria Cardona and Maura Gillespie, thank you so much, ladies, for coming on this morning. Appreciate it. Kate?

BOLDUAN: This morning, officials from the FAA and the NTSB are headed to Capitol Hill to share their early findings on their investigation into the deadly collision between the helicopter and the passenger jet in Washington over the Potomac.

And any moment we are going to be hearing from President Trump. He will be speaking. There's the Senate Majority Leader right now, John Thune. They're going to be hearing from President Trump speaking at the national prayer breakfast that is now getting underway on the Capitol. We'll be bringing you that moment coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:17:26]

BOLDUAN: This morning we are standing by to learn new details into the investigation about that tragic mid-air collision between the passenger jet and the military helicopter in Washington, DC.

NTSB and FAA investigators are set to be briefing lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

We're showing you a live look of the Potomac River right now where, as we know and have watched day in and day out crews continue their work, expected to remove the final large pieces of the American Eagle Jet from the Potomac River.

CNN's Gabe Cohen is joining us right now. He's got much more on this.

Gabe, you have been giving us updates day by day on how the recovery effort is going in the Potomac and identification of all of the victims. So, what are we expecting to hear when investigators head to Capitol Hill today?

GABE COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kate, we expect it's going to be a significant day on the Hill, as well as at the wreckage site. We know those officials from the NTSB and FAA are going to be there to brief that bipartisan group of lawmakers about everything they've learned from all of the flight data, the black boxes, even their early analysis of the wreckage.

What we don't know at this point is what answers they're actually going to have, those officials for lawmakers just eight days after the crash. Remember all of those pieces of wreckage from the American Airlines jet that we have watched get pulled out of the Potomac, they have just made their way to a hangar where investigators are starting to lay them out and get a closer examination.

They're going to be looking for several things. They're going to be looking for witness marks, visible signs of damage that may explain how this crash unfolded. They're going to be looking at the general airworthiness of the plane.

Plus, they're going to be looking at data from the cockpit. They want to understand what exactly where the pilots on that jet looking at just before the crash.

All of that, as they continue to recover some of the final pieces of the jet from the water.

As for the helicopter, Kate, and this is a really significant update we are getting --

BOLDUAN: Gabe, I'm so sorry I have to jump in. President Trump is now speaking on Capitol Hill at the National Prayer Breakfast. Let's jump in.

DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT-ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: ... a little faster than people thought. Thank you especially to Senator Marshall for the beautiful introduction. Appreciate it very much. Thank you. Great senator, you are.

I also want to thank a friend and a man of profound faith and tremendous patriotism who has also become a great friend. You become much friendlier when you have a majority of two or three or four, could even be five pretty soon, but for a little while it was one. And that's Mike Johnson, Speaker, thank you very much, Mike, very much.

(APPLAUSE)

[08:20:15]

And thanks, as well to somebody who's doing a fantastic job. Senator Thune, thank you very much, Senator.

(APPLAUSE) TRUMP: It's not easy. It's really great. And the leader, Scalise -- Steve, wherever you may be, I know I think you're here someplace. There he is, a brave guy, too, a brave guy, I always say it.

And Senator Chuck Schumer, Chuck, thank you very much, thank you.

Senator Hassan, thank you very much. Thank you, very nice to see you.

Congressman Jeffries, thank you.

And many other very distinguished leaders in the room. It's great, great group of people.

If we could ever come together, it would be unbelievable. It may not happen, but it should and maybe it will.

From the earliest days of our Republic, faith in God has always been the ultimate source of the strength that beats in the hearts of our nation.

We have to bring religion back. We have to bring it back much stronger. It's one of the biggest problems that we've had over the last fairly long period of time.

We have to bring it back.

Thomas Jefferson himself once attended Sunday services held in the old house chamber on the very ground where I stand today. So, there could be nothing more beautiful than for us to gather in this majestic place -- it is majestic -- and reaffirm that America is and will always be, one nation under God.

At every stage of the American story, our country has drawn hope and courage and inspiration from our trust in the Almighty.

Deep in the soul of every patriot is the knowledge that God has a special plan and a glorious mission for America. And that plan is going to happen. It's going to happen. I hope it happens sooner rather than later. It's going to happen.

And it's His hand that guides us every single step of the way. And all of you and the things we have to do is to see the defining role that faith and prayer have played in the life of our nation.

And you just have to look at this building, and you can look at each other. You can really look at each other. It's defined almost everyone in this room.

I think faith has been very strong with the people in this room, just steps away from here in the Hall of Columns is the statue of John Winthrop, who famously proclaimed that America would stand as a city upon a hill, a light to all nations, with the eyes of all people upon us.

Today, almost 400 years after that famous sermon, we see that with the Lord's help, the city stands taller and shines brighter than ever before or at least it soon will.

In that same hall, we also find the statue of the great Roger Williams, who founded the state of Rhode Island, named its capital city Providence, and built the first Baptist Church in America. It's Williams that we have to thank for making religious liberty part of the bedrock of American life.

And today we must protect the fundamental freedom with absolute devotion. We must stand strong, just like generations of Americans have done on the battlefields all around the world.

Feet away from the magnificent Rotunda, another statue watches over visitors to the Capitol. George Washington, the founder of our country, often called for Americans to join together in prayer, very often.

And more than two centuries later, this morning, we heed President Washington's wisdom and follow in his mighty footsteps. He was a strong man and of great religious strength.

The stories of legends like Washington, Winthrop, and Williams remind us that without faith in God, there would be no American story. Every citizen should be proud of this exceptional heritage. We have an unbelievable heritage and we have to use that and make life better for everyone.

[08:25:11]

That's why as we approach the 25th times ten anniversary, think of that -- 250 years we'll be celebrating next year of our country's founding, I have signed an executive order to resume the process of creating a new National Park full of statues of the greatest Americans who ever lived.

We're going to be honoring our heroes, honoring the greatest people from our country. We're not going to be tearing down. We're going to be building up. It would be called the National Garden of American Heroes.

Some of you will be on that soon to be hallowed ground, some of you. Let's see, I can pick a few of you right now by looking, because there's a couple of you right now, I can see, let's see -- it's the president's sole opinion --

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: And I've given myself a 25-year period and then somebody else, by that time, it'll be very, very built up.

No, it will be something very special and I hope that Congress will fully fund this wonderfully unifying project at the first possible opportunity. It's not going to be a lot of money. It's going to be very important, however, so that more of our people can be inspired by the faith and courage of patriots like those who we honor in these halls. One of the incredible Americans whose memory my order will celebrate is also recognized with a statue in the Capitol representing the great state of North Carolina and that's a man known who everybody loved, Reverend Billy Graham. He was something.

My father used to take me to watch the Crusades. He would take me to Yankee Stadium, I remember it so well. I remember it more than I remember any Yankee game and I've seen a lot of Yankee games.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: Can you believe it?

And Billy didn't have a bat, so, you know, he was pretty good.

It was amazing. He'd have 60,000 or 70,000 people and they loved him. They loved him. I saw him with Franklin. I don't know if Franklin is here. I just don't know. But I've gotten to know Franklin. He's done a great job with helping on tragedies, on problems like in North Carolina, California. He's always the first one there. The work he does is -- his father is very proud of him; I can tell you that.

But Billy Graham was very special.

One floor below us, Reverend Graham's statue stands with an open Bible. The page turned to a letter from the Apostle Paul which reads: "Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap if we do not give up."

Never give up, never, ever give up, you can't.

How about me? If I would have given up, I would not be here right now. Who the hell knows where I'd be? It might not be a good place. If it was up to the Democrats, it would not be a good place at all.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: Never, ever give up. There could be no better message for the leaders gathered here, and you are real leaders, and we must never give up and we must never grow tired, we must never grow weary, and we always must practice good.

As you know, last week, only a few miles from here, our nation witnessed a terrible tragedy when 67 people were killed in a horrible accident near Reagan Airport. As one nation, we take solace in the knowledge that their journey that night did not end in the icy waters of the Potomac, but in the warm embrace of a very loving God.

None of us knows exactly when our time on earth will be over. You'll never know. A truth I confronted a few short months ago when there was an incident that wasn't -- it was not fun. It was not a good thing. But God was watching me.

The chances of me being here, my sons are shooters, they're really good shooters, Don and Eric, and they said the chances of missing from that range with that gun are -- Don equated it to a one-foot putt. That's pretty bad. Two feet, I can see missing, but one foot you can't miss.

It was the equivalent of a one-foot putt, is what he told me. He said that. In fact, he gained some religion. He gained -- he went up 25 percent.

And, if you know him that's a lot.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: But he said there had to be somebody that saved you, and I think I know who it is, and he looked up and I said, woah, Don, you've come a long way.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: He's a good guy, but -- they -- my two sons just really couldn't believe it. Had I not turned, that right turn just at that time, and the audience 55,000 people standing this way, there were just a few people in the back on the bleachers, there was nobody over there except for my all-time favorite chart in history, the chart on immigration.

Immigration saved my life. So, we're going to be good for immigration, okay.

[08:30:51]