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Potential Consequences of Closure of USAID Examined; Department of Government Efficiency Employee Resigns after Controversial Social Media Posts Surface; U.S. House of Representatives and Senate Working on Different Bills for Federal Budget; Lawmakers Push to Ban China's DeepSeek from US Government Devices; Interview with Rep. Darin LaHood (R-IL). Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired February 07, 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: What will it mean with 10,000 employees, if indeed this happens the way the Trump administration and Elon Musk's DOGE group wants it too, 10,000 employees leaving, whether they are fired or pushed out or resigned? With just 300 people about left is the agency essentially closed? What will that do to the work of the USAID?

RANDY CHESTER, USAID VICE PRESIDENT, AMERICAN FOREIGN SERVICE ASSOCIATION: -- We will be effectively closed. We will not be able to do any work that we have been doing for the last 60 years, since USAID was founded. Humanitarian assistance will stop. Food aid will stop being distributed. Medication to fight HIV will stop. Immunization programs will stop. Programs that support the private sector development and create jobs in countries overseas will stop. Our partnerships with American companies will stop.

And not only that, in addition to the 10,000 USAID employees, the private sector and the nonprofit sector will also face tremendous layoffs as they are forced to reduce their staff because they no longer have funds from the U.S. government. And these are groups like World Vision, Catholic Relief Services, Save the Children, numerous small businesses in America.

And lastly, let me just say this. If we stop humanitarian assistance, we buy that food from American farmers. Close to $2 billion a year is purchasing American produced farm commodities. I'm not sure where those farm commodities are going to sold if the U.S. government isn't buying it and distributing it overseas to save lives.

SIDNER: Randy Chester, thank you for giving us some sense of just how broad of an impact this could make, everything from people not receiving HIV medications to farmers not being able to sell their products, and having to figure out where else they can make their money. I really appreciate you coming on at this difficult time.

A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, a judge halts the president's plans to purge the government workforce. So what's next?

We're standing by for a critical jobs report. Just minutes away, new details on what it will mean for you.

And what is the one Super Bowl commercial you will be talking about on Monday? You don't have to wait until Monday. We'll tell you now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ever ask yourself how Buffalo got a team?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These wings deserve a team.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you got a good team name for Buffalo, Bill. Buffalo. Buffalo.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They'd do anything to sell food.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Yes, not sure if it will be that ad, but maybe. We'll let you know.

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

SIDNER: This morning, President Trump's plan to overhaul the federal workforce is on hold. A federal judge paused the Trump administration's so-called buyout offer, pushing back yesterday's deadline to Monday. The judge halting the program amid a fight over whether it's even legal. So far, at least 65,000 federal workers, though, have accepted the offer to resign.

Now, federal unions are questioning whether the Trump administration will actually be able to follow through on the promise of continuing to pay those employees through September. One union has called it a, quote, clear case of bait and switch, saying some IRS workers who accepted the offer have been told they have to work through May 15th for the tax filing season instead of leaving immediately. All of that is playing out as Elon Musk loses a key DOGE staffer who resigned after he was linked to controversial posts online.

CNN's Kevin Liptak is at the White House for us. Kevin, what is the White House saying about this pause in their offer to buy out, if you will, some of these employees, but really, to push out these employees?

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Well, they say that they're grateful that this deadline has been extended for federal workers to essentially choose to put themselves on paid administrative leave until September or face the risk of layoffs, which is something that the White House has said are coming as they work to drastically reduce the size of the federal government.

Now, as of last night, as you said, about 65,000 federal workers had taken the White House up on its offer. That is well below their target of five to ten percent of the federal workforce, or about 100,000 people. I'll also just note, it's well below just annual attrition numbers in the government. Every year, about 100,000 people retire from the government, so they're well below just that level alone.

And I think it just goes to show the degree of suspicion and skepticism that a lot of federal workers have around this offer.

[08:05:03]

They're really wondering whether that money will actually materialize. That was the crux of this lawsuit from those three federal unions, who are essentially saying that because Congress hasn't appropriated this money for severance, that it may not be legal now. And I think that just goes to show how much federal workers are regarding this plan and how suspicious they are of what the White House is trying to do.

Now, yesterday, the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, after this was put on hold, said that they were grateful for the judge for extending the deadline so more federal workers who refused to show up to the office can take the administration up on this very generous, once in a lifetime offer.

But at the end of the day, this is just one of so many executive actions that the president has taken that will be tied up in courts. In part, this was the strategy, to flood the zone, to flood the courts with these actions, potentially reaching all the way to the Supreme Court. The White House, when it comes to all of these legal challenges, feels very good about where they will stand with the high court that has a conservative majority.

SIDNER: Kevin, can you give us some details of what happened with one of Elon Musk's DOGE employees who ended up having to resign himself?

LIPTAK: Yes, and this is all to speak to these teams that are being implanted in government agencies and departments with an enormous amount of suspicion by the agencies themselves. This was an individual who had been assigned to Treasury, who had been given access to some Treasury payment systems, who resigned after some old social media posts surfaced advocating racist and eugenic viewpoints. After "The Wall Street Journal" raised these posts with the White House, he resigned.

And I think it just goes to speak to some of the individuals who are part of this effort, led by Donald Trump and Elon Musk, to gain access to data systems, to payment systems across the federal government as they work to dramatically reshape how that government will look.

SIDNER: Yes, a lot of people concerned, unelected and some of them unvetted. Kevin Liptak, thank you so much for your reporting there from the White House. John?

BERMAN: Got to say, an angelic Kevin Liptak with a halo effect right there. He just looks dreamy this morning.

(LAUGHTER)

BERMAN: There he is.

SIDNER: Look at him.

BERMAN: Yes, really? Thank you. Thank you, Kevin. We'll let you float away on angel's wings.

SIDNER: We're a chorus this morning.

BERMAN: So this morning, the path of a huge part of President Trump's agenda is up in the air. In theory, he needs Congress for this, though he's largely gone behind its back for most of the last few weeks. But he will need Congress for the budget, tax cuts, legislation. And right now, Congress is struggling to figure out how to manage all of this.

Let's get right to CNN's Lauren Fox. Lauren, Republicans trying to find a path. How close are they?

LAUREN FOX, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Republicans have unified government. They have the House. They have the Senate. They have the White House. And yet there's deep divisions between the strategy that both House Republicans and Senate Republicans are moving toward.

Right now, both of those chambers on a collision course. And this isn't about Republicans and Democrats going up against one another, but Republicans within those two chambers have two very different views right now of how to approach Donald Trump's agenda. And here's a little bit of the dynamic that's going on.

In the Senate, they are tired of waiting and they want to move forward with this two bill strategy. Essentially, they're going to move forward next week with the first step in trying to pass a budget and defense bill that would include about $150 in border -- $150 billion, excuse me, in border security, $150 billion in defense spending. And then that would be offset by additional cuts. Senator Lindsey Graham, who's the budget chairman, said he's going to take those first steps next week.

Meanwhile, House Republicans have been trying to work toward a one big, beautiful bill strategy for Donald Trump, arguing that that is the way that they want to move forward. They met at the White House, Republican leadership, Donald Trump, J.D. Vance, for about five hours yesterday, trying to hash out exactly how to move forward. They've had deep divisions within their conference about how much spending to cut. You have conservatives who want to have more than $2 trillion in cuts. You have leadership who initially floated a number under $1 trillion. So there's a lot of confusion right now about how they're going to move forward. But they are saying they made a lot of progress yesterday. Here's Speaker Johnson.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MIKE JOHNSON, (R-LA) HOUSE SPEAKER: Our message to our friends and colleagues in the Senate is allow the House to do its work. We are moving this as quickly and as expeditiously as possible. Very positive developments today. We're really grateful to the president for leaning in.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FOX: And reading between the lines, you can hear Speaker Johnson essentially saying, lay off, U.S. Senate. Let us move forward with our own budget bill next week.

[08:10:00]

So far, though, what we are seeing from Senate Republicans is they're going to move ahead with their plan to. So you're potentially going to have two different plans moving through Congress in each chamber. And then they're just going to have to fight it out and decide whose plan has the most votes. John?

BERMAN: A little House on Senate crime here and vice versa. Nice to see that some things in Washington never change. Lauren Fox, thank you so much for being with us. Kate?

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: And joining us right now is CNN senior political analyst Mark Preston. It's good to see you, Mark.

Let's get to the one big beautiful bill in just a second. Let's start with the swift and massive move by Donald Trump and Elon Musk to streamline the federal government, which has meant, so far, massive cuts and disruption to agencies and programs. USAID is seeing real impact right now, and it's emblematic of what they're going for. I've seen reporting in "The New York Times" of dozens of clinical trials all over the world on medicines, fighting everything from malaria to cholera. They've been suspended mid-trial with unclear what these people who are in the middle of the trial do now. I mean, do you think there is any buyer's remorse with the Elon Musk approach to streamlining things?

MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: No. In fact, I think that they're looking at it as a huge success because no one has been able to stop them. And in fact. If you hear people now talking here in Washington, they're telling Democrats to let USAID go. Just let it go, because it's a loser. And it's a loser in the sense that you can go through and pick out any program in USAID, and you can make a case about why the United States shouldn't be using its tax dollars to spend overseas.

Now, having said that, USAID is an organization that is much more than an aid organization that goes overseas. I mean, there's a lot of connections it has with our intelligence apparatus from the United States. And it also creates an ability to have a bit of soft power in these countries. You don't have to go in with guns, and you don't have to go in and, you know, in order to try to influence them.

BOLDUAN: That's why they see it as a good investment often. That's why they see it as a good investment.

PRESTON: Exactly. However, you can still go through and find out some something about condoms or about abortions or about something that is going to upset some people. But what is amazing, though, Kate, is that if they're able to do it

with USAID, are they going to be able to do it with every bit of government? And honestly, I don't know who can stop them at this point.

BOLDUAN: Is there any -- that, I guess, is the question. I mean, courts, maybe. There's challenges to some aspects of what they want to do with the federal workforce. But can Democrats do anything? I guess we have to set aside or ignore the fact that appropriators D and R alike forever have obsessively protected what is Congress's power in saying it is their sole power is, which is where they put taxpayer dollars and where taxpayer dollars are spent. Setting aside the fact that Republicans seem to not be obsessively protective of it at this moment.

PRESTON: Well, they've abdicated all of their -- they've abdicated the one third power of government that the framers created when they created our country, our nation here. Right, there's the executive, the legislative, and the judicial. Right now, Donald Trump owns all three. So I don't see Republicans pushing back at all on what Donald Trump wants.

As far as Democrats go, I mean, right now, they're toothless. They're toothless at this point. They don't seem to have a coherent message. There's certainly no leader right now, not to say that we should be critical of them because of that. They're obviously going through some changes.

But this is what I would say about the U.S. government, because I thought about this in just very simple terms. And I thought, could the U.S. government ever be the same from what it was, let's say, five years ago to, let's say, five years from now. And I thought about the lyrics to the nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty." "Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall. Humpty dumpty had a great fall. All the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty back together again." Now putting aside the fact that how could a horse even put together a broken egg person. But putting that aside, Kate, that's the U.S. government. It is fragile. It has fallen off the wall. It is shattered. Theres no way we're going to put it back the way that it was created back when this nation was put together back in 1776.

BOLDUAN: Yes. I mean, how many. Mark, I love you.

(LAUGHTER)

BOLDUAN: I just would like the record to reflect, I did see you look down to read this nursery rhyme, which also indicates how many times you read that nursery rhyme to your children, which is zero.

SIDNER: I'm judging, by the way. I'm sitting here literally, if I had glasses on, judging. You didn't know the words to "Humpty Dumpty."

BOLDUAN: Sara.

PRESTON: Not fake news. I will say that, I didn't know all the words.

(LAUGHTER)

SIDNER: At least he's accurate, always accurate.

BOLDUAN: Love Mark Preston. Accuracy is all that matters here. Mark Preston, I love you. Sara, I love you more.

SIDNER: That just happened on CNN. OK, you know, things happen.

[08:15:00]

All right, the new AI startup, DeepSeek shook up Wall Street, as you know. Now, some lawmakers are talking about banning the Chinese app from government devices. We will explain why.

And security measures have been amped up, of course, around New Orleans, how law enforcement is keeping the city safe as the Super Bowl is about to get underway.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:20:05]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, today, two lawmakers plan to introduce a bipartisan to introduce bipartisan legislation to ban Chinese startup DeepSeek's AI chatbot from all US government devices. They say new evidence shows that the app could provide user's potential information directly to the Chinese government.

With us now is one of the writers of that bill, Congressman Darin LaHood, Republican from Illinois.

Congressman, thanks so much for being with us. Explain why you're concerned about DeepSeek and how this bill would address it.

REP. DARIN LAHOOD (R-IL): Well, John, I've come to this conclusion about DeepSeek serving on the House Intelligence Committee. I also serve on our Select Committee on China, and from a National Security standpoint, we have to understand China is an adversary.

And when you look at this app and you look at DeepSeek and the direct connection to the CCP, the Communist Chinese Party, that's deeply disturbing to me. And Congressman Gottheimer and a number of other people.

As we've seen, the CCP continues to abide by a different set of rules and standards. They steal our intellectual property. They steal our personal data.

We've seen that with Huawei, we've seen it with TikTok, and now we've seen it with DeepSeek.

And I would also add, John, it's not just us that have noticed this. There's a number of other countries and allies around the globe that have banned DeepSeek. Australia has recently done it. Belgium has done it. Italy has done it. South Korea has done it. And so, we've introduced this legislation in a bipartisan way from a National Security standpoint and to protect the privacy rights and the data from US citizens.

BERMAN: Right now, you're trying to ban it from government devices. Ultimately, do you think you'll need to take action on all devices in the US?

LAHOOD: Of course, similar to what we did with TikTok, we should be looking at it.

I also would say this, John, I start with the predicate -- let's not forget China has a plan to replace the United States, and they're working at it every single day. They want to beat us technologically, militarily, economically, diplomatically.

And again, it's interesting on DeepSeek, you will never see any criticism of Xi Jinping, of the Communist Chinese Party. You won't see any support for Taiwan and their freedom and opportunity there.

This is something that shouldn't be on government devices. We cannot trust the CCP to be involved with this app and this AI apparatus.

BERMAN: So, Congressman, your concerns sound a lot like the concerns that you voiced when you voted for the TikTok ban last year, correct?

LAHOOD: Correct.

BERMAN: And President Trump has kind of paused that because he said he used the app and he liked it. So, what concerns do you have over the fact that that, you know, this ban, the TikTok ban that you voted on, that Congress passed is not currently now being implemented?

LAHOOD: Well, I think it will. I mean, it's going through the legal process. If you look at the vote in the House of Representatives on the TikTok ban, overwhelmingly bipartisan.

And by the way, at the time, JD Vance supported it in the Senate, Marco Rubio supported it, Mike Waltz supported it, Elise Stefanik supported it -- all people in the new administration.

I have confidence that the way we wrote the law, the way that it's been upheld by the Supreme Court, I think it's just a matter of time before what we ask to do, which is to have the Communist Chinese Party not be a part of TikTok and I think there'll be a divestment here soon.

BERMAN: Do you think it's unfortunate that it has to wait at least until April?

LAHOOD: Well, yes, I think waiting an extra month and giving time to find a new buyer and separating it from the Communist Chinese Party is part of the process. I would also say that putting Vice President Vance in charge of this, as President Trump has done working with the National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz, I have immense confidence in both of them to look out for the best interest of US citizens and to protect our data and make sure the Communist Chinese Party, our adversary, is not, you know, stealing our intellectual property.

BERMAN: You mentioned some of the news that I first saw. I think it was in Punchbowl this morning, which is that the Vice President and Mike Waltz, the National Security adviser have been put in charge of trying to find a buyer.

Do you actually think that ByteDance wants to sell its algorithm? And would you be satisfied with anything other than a complete separation from China altogether?

LAHOOD: Well, if you look at the genesis of the legislation related to TikTok, that's exactly what we asked for. That's what the Congress overwhelmingly voted for.

Yes, we can't have any affiliation with the CCP. Again, the CCP abides by a different set of rules and standards. Go back and look at Huawei. Look at what TikTok has done, look at the fact that again, there's a back door to the Communist Chinese Party and they have a track record that, you know, has been adversarial to the United States.

They are an adversary and need to be treated that way. And I think both of them will come up with a solution that protects America.

BERMAN: Well, we will see. As you said, there is a law in place not exactly being followed by the letter of it at this point, but we'll see what happens.

Congressman Darin LaHood, we appreciate you being with us this morning -- Kate.

[08:25:28]

BOLDUAN: This morning the NCAA is releasing new guidance and rules on the heels of President Trump's latest action to ban transgender athletes from women's sports. We will get that -- bring that to you.

And in just a few minutes, the first Jobs Report of the new Trump administration.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: More than 700 law enforcement officers are in New Orleans, and that is just one aspect of the massive security plan now in place to secure the Super Bowl.

[08:30:16]