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20 Injured After Car Drives Into Crowd Of Protesters In Munich; Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) On Trump Saying Talks To End Russia-Ukraine Conflict Will Start "Immediately"; Hamas Says It Will Release Israeli Hostages As Planned. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired February 13, 2025 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00]

MATT EGAN, CNN REPORTER: Well John, look, this is what it looks like when a federal regulator gets paralyzed. We are learning that multiple expert witnesses that had been hired by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau -- the CFPB -- have had their contracts terminated in recent days. These are professors, researchers, and others that had been hired by the CFPB to bring cases against companies that have been accused of ripping off consumers.

Now, one of these experts told me that they were shocked because they had been working on this case for literally years. Another one said, "The richest man in the world is coming in to shut down a case where a lender is cheating working people. It's utterly outrageous."

Now that is, of course, a reference to Elon Musk who has presided over this effort to sideline the consumer watchdog -- the CFPB.

Remember, it was just a week ago or so that Musk posted that message on his social media platform X, saying, "RIP CFPB" with a tombstone emoji. Nothing subtle about that.

And really, that set off a whole series of actions at the CFPB. The staff were told to stop doing virtually all work, including fighting financial crime, effectively removing the cop from the beat. Expert witnesses and probationary workers have been terminated. The headquarters has been shut down. Workers were told not just to stay home and work at home but not to do any work at all.

And I've got to tell you, everyone I've talked to related to this CFPB situation -- they're nervous, right? One expert witness told me they didn't want their name in print. This person said they're scared. They're -- don't know if someone's going to try to sue them or perhaps send an FBI agent.

And John, there's just this sense that there's more shoes that are going to drop on this front.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Just explain in general terms for people who may not have been around after the financial crash why the CFPB is so important. EGAN: Yeah. I mean, I know there's this alphabet soup of regulators, but the CFPB is really the one that is supposed to be fighting for consumers when they get scammed by banks or mortgage lenders, or credit card companies. It's the brainchild of Elizabeth Warren.

It did come out after the great financial crisis and it's gone after a number of companies that it has accused of doing bad things, right? Really ripping off consumers -- most famously, Wells Fargo, but also student lenders. It's accused Bank of America of opening fake accounts essentially. It's gone after a number of different companies.

And the problem though is that it's been so aggressive that it's become a target of the big banks. The White House argues that it's become weaponized.

I talked to Isaac Boltansky, a policy analyst, and he said look, the Trump administration -- they can't delete the CFPB, but they can hollow it out.

BERMAN: Sure.

EGAN: And he said that's what we're seeing in real time.

BERMAN: All right, Matt Egan. Thanks for explaining it so well.

EGAN: Thanks, John.

BERMAN: All right, Sara.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: All right, breaking news. A driver has been arrested now after plowing his car into a crowd of protesters in Munich. At least 20 people have been injured there. And it all happened just hours before Vice President J.D. Vance arrives in the city for a major security conference there.

CNN producer Sebastian Shukla joins us now with the very latest on this. What are you hearing this morning? I know there is still a very active scene behind you.

SEBASTIAN SHUKLA, CNN FIELD PRODUCER: Yeah. The scene behind me, Sara, as you can see, is of one still of chaos and detritus left all over the floor.

What we do know now is that a 24-year-old asylum seeker originally from Afghanistan has now been arrested and is the perpetrator. He drove that white car -- that white mini that you can see there and left this chaos behind him. You can even see a push chair there and it is believed that one of the injured -- very heavily and very bad injured is a -- is a child.

Just after the attack happened, we had a senior Bavarian politician come down here, Markus Soder, and he said that he suspected that this was also an attack without offering any other evidence. But the issue of attacks here in Germany is becoming one that is a very, very serious one and evermore prominent as we get closer to an election here with immigration, in particular -- illegal immigration becoming a main political issue.

But as you mentioned Sara, and as you can probably see, this is a busy junction -- or what would be a busy junction and it's crawling with police officers. And, in fact, the entire city is crawling with police officers from outside restaurants, into the pedestrian areas, into the Old City around the hotels because we have a major international conference going on here, right?

You said Vice President J.D. Vance is coming. The Secretary of State Marco Rubio will also be here along with other delegations and other heads of state from around the world for the Munich Security Conference. So as expected, you would -- you would expect to see an increased police presence.

So one of the questions that will be asked now is how did this attack happen with so many police officers here, Sara?

[07:35:00]

SIDNER: And Seb, I know that you will be staying on this. There are a lot of questions as to what the motive was of this person who rammed into all of those 20 people, including -- as you said, there was a pram there. It looks like a child also caught up in this horrific attack or accident. We just don't know yet.

I know you'll stay on it. We appreciate your time there from Munich, Germany -- Kate.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Also this morning Russia's foreign minister is now speaking out about the future of the war with Ukraine after President Trump said negotiations to end it will start immediately.

Now, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin -- they spoke on the phone for 90 minutes yesterday. Trump described it as a highly productive phone call and also said that he could soon meet with Vladimir Putin in Saudi Arabia.

CNN's Fred Pleitgen is in Moscow for us and he's joining us now. And Fred, as I mentioned, now Russia's foreign minister is speaking out. What is he saying?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, Kate. I was just at a press conference with the Russian foreign minister a couple of minutes ago and I asked him whether or not he believes that now there will be a true improvement in U.S.-Russian relations.

And he used that to launch into a tirade against the Biden administration and against the U.S.' European allies before then making a turn and praising President Trump for this phone call, saying that both President Trump and the Russian president were polite and well-mannered individuals having a conversation about the future of the relations. So obviously for the Russians this is all very important.

But Kate, one of the things that we need to point out is just the vibe here on the ground in Moscow since that phone conversation happened. The Russians now very much in the mode where they want things to happen very quickly. They want talks very quickly. They want improvements with the U.S. very quickly.

The Kremlin came out earlier today in a conference call with journalists and said that they were very impressed by President Trump's positions on the Ukraine conflict and also generally towards Russia. The Russians are already saying that they're putting together teams to try and lead those negotiations with the Trump administration.

Obviously, right now, the vibe that they're getting here is that they believe they now have a president in the White House who understands Russia. Who backs Russia's positions in many ways. And they also feel that the U.S.' European allies have been weakened in all of this. And, of course, Ukraine has been weakened as well.

BOLDUAN: Fred Pleitgen, always great to have you. Thank you so much for being there and for your reporting, Fred -- Sara.

SIDNER: All right. Joining me now, Democratic congressman from New York Gregory Meeks. He is the top-ranking Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

I want to read you a headline our Stephen Collinson has put out -- our political analyst. He says, "U.S. relations with Europe will never be the same after Trump's call with Putin."

Do you agree?

REP. GREGORY MEEKS (D-NY): Yeah. Look, if you listen to Donald Trump, you would think that Russia was America's ally and our NATO friends were our enemies. Donald Trump is with Russia. We knew all along because Russia has been punished -- Ukraine has been winning this war with the only thing that Putin had been trying to do is to hold on and pray for (audio gap), and that's what's taking place. So the -- it's upside-down.

And I would hope my Republican allies -- my Republican colleagues, I should say, in Congress who were allies with NATO and Ukraine -- their voices now need to be heard.

We traveled to Ukraine together collectively talking about Russia and their illegal invasion and the killing of innocent Ukrainians in that invasion. We were there. The first CODEL I led to Ukraine and to Poland right after the invasion and we saw all of the Ukrainians running for their lives.

And we were locked in step, Democrats and Republicans. We need those Republican voices now in Congress to stand up. To go back at Donald Trump because he is utilizing and it looks like taking Putin as our ally and when they are not, as opposed to our real allies, NATO and our European allies.

SIDNER: I was in Ukraine myself. I saw some of the horrific destruction and the families that were literally blown apart. From -- but -- from what you are seeing now is the United States going to abandon Ukraine?

MEEKS: Look, from what I'm seeing and hearing -- I mean, it's the same thing that we heard under the first Trump administration. He sided with Russia then almost on everything. Remember he was even giving Russia national security and confidential information in the White House.

So he wants to abandon, apparently, Ukraine. And that's why I call on my Republican colleagues to stand up and to fight back on this. This is our job as members of the legislature.

It -- I talked to a number of Ukrainian legislators who was visiting here in the Capitol just this week and they were asking in a -- for bipartisan support to continue to support Ukraine. Because when you see that when we do support Ukraine they win. They're fighting. They're -- when you look at the number of individuals on the Russian side who have been killed and you look at their economy, they're on the verge of losing. The only way that they don't lose is if we don't support Ukraine.

[07:40:15]

And so we're at a -- I don't know how the President of the United States could say this war is going to go over and do negotiations with Russia without Ukraine. It would seem to me it would be the opposite. That pressure should be put on Russia to not take territory.

But the truth of the matter is I guess Trump and Putin talk the same language because as Putin is invading European allies and moving forward -- we know he's not going to just stop at Ukraine. We hear these crazy conversations that our own president is talking about -- taking Greenland. Going and taking Panama. Going and taking over Gaza. So they seem to be talking the same language, and that's my concern.

We are the United States of America. We are not Russia.

SIDNER: Let me ask you about that because you just mentioned some of the places that that president said that the U.S. is going to take -- Greenland, Gaza, and the Panama Canal -- or take back when he talks about the Panama Canal.

But Americans voted for Donald Trump who told them what he was going to do pretty much when it came to wars. That he was going to pull out of any war that he didn't want American tax dollars being spent to help any foreign wars or what he called lifelong foreign wars.

So isn't this what the public voted for?

MEEKS: Well, no. I think that what the public voted for -- they wanted that -- they wanted the price of groceries to go down. They wanted inflation to go down. They were talking about their average everyday lives. They wanted the cost of gas to go down. And we see that the president is not delivering on any of that. They never thought that their focus were on their domestic issues. And

this president has not looked at any of that. They never thought that he would take over Greenland or do some of the crazy things that he's talking about right now -- Gaza.

But Project 2025 -- when you looked at the foreign aspect of it -- and we urged individuals to make sure that they read it and looked at it, and digested it, then you could see who he is and what he would move forward.

And I think that it is important that Congress, in a bipartisan way -- we need my -- our Republican colleagues. They did not intend for him to do or go in the direction that he's going in right now. They should stand up.

I mean, there were so many of them that was united. We locked arms in arm meeting with President Biden and talking about making sure that Ukraine had all of the ammunition and everything that it needed. It still does.

And I would hope that those individuals that advocated for it, including the Secretary of State, advocates for it right now. It is their moral -- but not only moral -- I believe it is their responsibility -- their legislative responsibility to stand up to this president because we are a body that's supposed to oversee what the president and his policies are moving forward on foreign policy as well as domestic policy.

SIDNER: As you have seen, they have capitulated on just about everything when it comes to what Donald Trump wants, so far. We will see what happens in the future.

Representative Gregory Meeks, thank you so much for coming on this morning. I appreciate your time -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: Coming up for us, new evidence that popular weight loss drugs like Ozempic may have other important benefits that come with it when it comes to alcohol. What is it about that drug? We'll get to it.

And Elon Musk brings his son for his Oval Office press conference and now that child's mother is speaking out. "He should not be in public like this."

(COMMERCIAL)

[07:48:45]

BOLDUAN: So there's new research out about the wildly popular new category of weight loss drugs and the research showing medicines like Ozempic could have another benefit -- curbing cravings for alcohol.

CNN's Meg Tirrell has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, we've heard from people who are taking Ozempic and similar medicines that they not only reduce the amount of food that they want to eat but also for some people they can reduce the amount of alcohol that they feel like drinking. But this really hadn't been studied in an organized way until now.

So in this new clinic trial they looked at 48 people who reported having signs of sort of moderate alcohol use disorder. And they put half of the people on Ozempic -- low doses of Ozempic -- and half on a placebo. And over nine weeks they monitored how much alcohol they drank and also their cravings for alcohol.

And what they found is a significant effect on both the amount of alcohol they drank and how much they craved it. In fact, at the end of the nine weeks people on semaglutide, or Ozempic, drank about 40 percent less alcohol than those on placebo.

Now, they think that this might be working in this way because we know that these medicines work not just in the gut but also in the brain, and there might be an effect on sort of the reward system around things like alcohol.

[07:50:00]

Interestingly, they also looked at cigarette use in the trial among about 13 people who reported also smoking. Now that's a very small sample size but what they saw is that over the course of the nine weeks people on Ozempic reported smoking fewer cigarettes per day as well.

Now this needs to be borne out in larger and longer clinical trials before these drugs could be prescribed widely for things like alcohol use disorder or smoking cessation, and additional trials are underway. But this is really sort of the first study that we've seen in this really organized way to show this effect. And so there is hope that these medicines could add to an arsenal of addiction treatment, which unfortunately has been fairly lacking.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: All right. This morning severe weather warnings across the country. Evacuation alerts have been issued in California over the threat of mudslides.

Let's get right to CNN meteorologist Allison Chinchar. You've got a lot on your plate this morning, Allison.

ALLISON CHINCHAR, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, we do -- yeah. We take a look at this big system here that you can see sliding into the West Coast not just for California. Other states will see the impact here as well.

But flooding is going to be the biggest concern and certainly most widespread. You've got all of these flood watches in effect for this area and even a few flash flood warnings. You can see just south of San Francisco here near the Santa Clara and Santa Cruz area just heavy rain constantly coming into that area. But they're not alone. Look at this. The entire swath of the state of

California is getting some type of precipitation up and down the coast. It's also spreading into Oregon as well as Nevada and other states here too.

It's also the snow component. We've talked about the rain, but the snow is also going to be quite significant. You've got all of these winter weather advisories and winter storm warnings. Some of these spots could have snowfall up to eight feet -- not inches, feet of snow by the time this system is all said and done.

Wind is also going to be a component. So take a lot of that snow that's coming down and it's being blown around. That's going to reduce visibility down to pretty much zero in some spots because you're looking at some of those wind gusts up around 60 to 80 miles per hour.

Now, when we look at this system as a whole it's going to last pretty much throughout the entire day today with very few breaks for a lot of these spots. So it's just that constant moisture that's trailing into a lot of these areas. Even through most of the day Friday you still have a lot of that moisture that lingers. So it's the nonstop nature of this over the next 24 to 36 hours.

You've also got that potential for all of the flooding not just in Northern California but even stretching down into Southern California. Even around the Los Angeles area here you have that moderate risk -- that level three out of four -- for the excessive rainfall.

And one of the big concerns here, again, is from those fires you have those burn scar areas. That could lead to landslides and even some mudslides around those particular regions. So that's going to be another concern, especially the volume of rain that we're talking about here. Widespread totals of three to five inches, but some spots not out of the question to pick up half a foot of rain.

BERMAN: Just the wild weather extremes we've seen out West.

Allison Chinchar, thank you very much for that -- Sara.

SIDNER: Thank you, John.

This is terrifying -- a gas explosion at a shopping mall in Taiwan. The view from the traffic outside as the walls blast open. It killed at least five people. Officials say it happened in a food court that was under construction on the 12th floor. You see it blowing out there and you can hear it -- terrifying. About 20 more people were hurt and hundreds had to be evacuated from the area.

All right, this is crazy. Stewart O'Leary is minding his business and doing his job as a bus driver in Washinton State when he's shuttling around the school's basketball team and suddenly a piece of metal flies through his windshield -- ow, God -- but he didn't freak out. He gently guided the bus to safety.

I mean, you hear that. He's like ow, that hurt. He even managed to take a picture of the damage as he was being loaded into the ambulance.

And get this. By the way, this man -- Superman -- he's already back on the job driving that bus again. No complaints -- wow.

All right, multiple sources are telling CNN that Elon Musk's social media company X has settled a lawsuit brought by President Trump over being deplatformed over the January 6 insurrection. The lawsuit dismissed Monday according to court filings and each side will cover its own legal fees. Trump sued in 2021 when the company was called Twitter, arguing that his speech was being unfairly censored -- surprise, surprise. It's all over now.

Trump settled a similar lawsuit, by the way, with Meta for about 25 million bucks -- John.

BERMAN: I want to talk about the bus driver.

SIDNER: I know.

BERMAN: That guy was one cool cat.

SIDNER: I know.

BERMAN: I want him on my side. Nothing fazes that guy.

SIDNER: He's like ow, and then he just kept driving and got everybody to safety. He's amazing.

BERMAN: And very impressive.

All right. For the first time the ex-girlfriend of Elon Musk is speaking out after their 4-year-old son made an appearance with his father in the Oval Office.

CNN's Sunlen Serfaty has the details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: X, are you OK?

[07:55:00]

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT (voiceover): From the Oval Office --

TRUMP: This is X and he's a great guy -- high I.Q.

SERFATY (voiceover): -- to rally stages --

ELON MUSK, HEAD OF DEPARTMENT OF GOVERNMENT EFFICIENCY: Um, sorry. Little X just followed me on the stage here. He's a very enthusiastic supporter, as you can see. Whoo!

SERFATY (voiceover): -- exclusive events at Mar-a-Lago, and even in the Halls of Congress --

REPORTER: Mr. Musk, what is DOGE?

SERFATY (voiceover): -- one of Elon Musk's sons, X, has made quite the political debut with his father --

MUSK: Yeah! We're going to do great -- do great things here. Thank you.

SERFATY (voiceover): -- eager to promenade him before cameras into some of the most powerful and high-level centers of Washington.

TRUMP: And his son's name -- who is cute as a button -- his son's name is X. He's the only guy who could get away with the name X.

SERFATY (voiceover): Musk's latest move bringing X into the Oval Office for an executive order signing this week creating moments of levity.

MUSK: ...is to restore democracy.

X, ELON MUSK'S SON: Please forgive me. I have to go pee.

SERFATY (voiceover): And Musk all too happy to engage with his son for the cameras.

MUSK: Well, if you don't have a feedback group -- OK, X. You would have to -- if you -- if you -- sorry. Sorry -- gravitas can be difficult sometimes.

SERFATY (voiceover): But X's mother, Canadian singer Grimes, making it clear she does not approve of how her former boyfriend is using their son, calling it "a personal tragedy" and directly responded to X's Oval Office appearance saying on X that she was only made aware of it after seeing it on social media.

"He should not be in the public like this," she said, "but I'm glad he was polite. Sigh."

Even as Musk continues to elevate the high-profile moment, retweeting picture after picture -- even one making the comparison to the famous photo of JFK and his son around the resolute desk.

MUSK: The United States of America!

SERFATY (voiceover): Musk shares two other children with Grimes, and 12 in all with two other women. Some of his other kids joining him in the spotlight, too.

MUSK: (INAUDIBLE) up with the agency heads. And I checked previously with the president to make sure that, you know, these -- this --

SERFATY (voiceover): For Musk, these moments, while endearing, could also be seen as calculated.

MUSK: I'm sorry for this. I thought my son might enjoy this but he's sticking his fingers in my ears and stuff, so it's been hard to hear sometimes. Hey, stop that. SERFATY (voiceover): Distractions from the realities of his political

wake.

MUSK: The people voted for major government reform and that's what the people are going to get.

SERFATY: And to that point, Elon Musk has called his son X his cuteness prop and is emotional support human. Musk, of course, is known for being a man that's very intentional with his image and very controlling of every aspect of that image. And so certainly there is an awareness of how he is coming across with this.

Meantime, X's mom has also picked up on this pattern of Musk bringing their son into a lot of these public, powerful moments. She said she believes that Musk sees him as his protege.

Sunlen Serfaty, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SIDNER: All right. Our thanks to Sunlen.

New this morning Hamas says it will release Israeli hostages as planned after positive talks with mediators, it says. Earlier this week Hamas accused Israel of violating the fragile Gaza ceasefire deal and said it would delay Saturday's hostage release.

CNN's Jeremy Diamond is in Tel Aviv. This does comes after Donald Trump threatened to rain hell down on them or all hell is going to break loose there if they do not return all of the hostages by Saturday.

What do you know?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, it certainly seems like things are getting back on track for this ceasefire to continue. Hamas now saying that they will indeed release three hostages as scheduled this Saturday less then 48 hours after they said that they would not, citing a series of Israeli ceasefire violations.

We also saw the Israeli prime minister, of course, saying that Israel would abandon this ceasefire and return to the fight in Gaza if indeed Hamas did not release hostages this coming Saturday.

But what has happened over the course of the last 48 hours have been intense discussions involving the mediators, Egypt and Qatar, as well as Hamas and Israel.

The mediators have been working to resolve this dispute on Hamas' side in terms of the amount of aid that has been going into Gaza, in particular. This issue about mobile homes that were supposed to go into the Gaza Strip to provide better shelter for displaced Palestinians inside of Gaza. And on the Israeli side, of course, ensuring that Hamas will indeed release hostages this coming Saturday.

I've been pinging a number of Israeli sources right now and they are declining to say whether Israel will actually abide by the terms of the ceasefire if Hamas releases three hostages. But one Israeli official telling me that there is no appetite inside the leadership of the Israeli government to abandon this ceasefire at the moment and that it seems like everything is heading in the direction of a resolution here and of Israel sticking to the terms of the ceasefire as long as Hamas releases those three Israeli hostages.

Keep in mind that even as the Israeli prime minister made that ultimatum, he did not go as far as Trump in terms of saying all hostages must be released this Saturday for the ceasefire agreement to continue.