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Judge Could Rule Today On USAID Freeze By Trump Admin; Officials: Pentagon Pauses Plan For Mass Firings After CNN Reports The Layoffs Could Violate The Law; Trump Administration Fires Thousands Of Federal Workers; Suspect Luigi Mangione Appears In NY State Court For Status Hearing; Trump: Zelenskyy Is Not "Important To Be At Meetings." Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired February 21, 2025 - 15:00   ET

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

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[15:00:01]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: A key test to President Donald Trump's power to reshape the federal government. A federal judge could rule today on the dismantling of USAID.

OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN HOST: Plus, the Defense Department is now temporarily pausing its plan to carry out mass firings of civilian employees. Pentagon lawyers are reviewing the legality of the planned terminations.

And new developments in the CEO murder case. Suspect Luigi Mangione appears in court. That was him entering just a few moments ago as dozens of his supporters line up outside. We're going to tell you what we know about this hearing and what's happened so far.

We're following these major developing stories and many more coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

KEILAR: Hello, I'm Brianna Keilar in Washington with Omar Jimenez in for Boris.

JIMENEZ: Great to see you.

KEILAR: Great to have you here. And we are standing by now for a key court ruling that could decide the fate of USAID. A judge could decide as soon as today on whether President Trump's executive order that dismantled that U.S. agency charged with delivering humanitarian assistance around the globe is legal.

JIMENEZ: And this is just the latest legal challenge for the Trump administration as it slashes the federal workforce and dismantles government agencies. Late yesterday, a federal judge cleared the way for Trump and Elon Musk's DOGE efforts to continue mass firings of federal workers. I want to bring in CNN's Jeff Zeleny now.

So Jeff, I mean, this is another test of the President's power to reshape the government. And it's a test that we have seen from the White House sometimes has brought tensions over what's taken place over on the legal front.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: It absolutely has, Omar. And with every executive order, there have been nearly as many legal cases. But you're right. This USAID ruling is one of the many that certainly the White House and really all across Washington and beyond are watching, because Judge Carl Nichols, who's a Trump appointee a week or so ago, put a one week pause on the dismantling of that agency.

So, we will see if there is a new ruling that adds some clarity about the future of USAID funding and the workforce there. But again, that is one of many, many rulings. Some have gone in favor of the Trump administration. Many have not. And many are under pause. But this is one of the many that could come in later today.

KEILAR: And Jeff, the President is meeting with governors this afternoon. We had a very tense exchange, as we understand it, with one of them. What can you tell us?

ZELENY: Absolutely. The nation's governors are meeting for their annual winter meeting here in Washington. And the President was meeting with many of them, a bipartisan group, a mix of Democrats and Republicans earlier this morning. And there was an extraordinary exchange between the President and the governor of Maine, Janet Mills, all over the executive order the President signed a few weeks ago about allowing a transgender athlete to play in women's sports. Watch this exchange between the President and Maine Governor Janet Mills.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And it's crazy, but the NCAA has complied immediately, by the way. That's good. But I understand Maine - is the Maine here, the governor of Maine.

GOV. JANET MILLS, (D) MAINE: I'm right here. I'm down here.

TRUMP: Are you not going to comply with it?

MILLS: I'm complying with state and federal laws.

TRUMP: Well, I'm - we are the federal law. Well, you better do it.

MILLS: The statutes ...

TRUMP: You better do it because you're not going to get any federal funding at all if you don't. And by the way, your population, even though it's somewhat liberal, although I did very well there, your population doesn't want men playing in women's sports, so you better ...

MILLS: (INAUDIBLE) ...

TRUMP: ... you better comply, because otherwise you're not getting any federal funding.

MILLS: See you in court. TRUMP: Every state - good, I'll see you in court. I look forward to that. That should be a really easy one.

MILLS: (INAUDIBLE) ...

TRUMP: And enjoy your life after governor, because I don't think you'll be in elected politics.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZELENY: So, some very sharp words there with the Governor. You couldn't quite see her, but she was sitting pretty close to the President at a table of other governors. She told the President directly, we'll see you in court.

Now, this is all coming after the Maine Principal's Association, which is a group that oversees high school athletes in Maine, has said that it would not comply and it would allow transgender student athletes to play. So, that was one pretty unusual exchange there. And you saw someone, A, standing up to the President about one of his rulings. So, the rest of the meeting was actually quite civil. But certainly we will see if there's a legal case on this front. As we heard the governor say, we'll see you in court.

JIMENEZ: A sparring in real time between the Democratic governor and Trump. See you in court.

KEILAR: It's something.

JIMENEZ: Yes. Yes, if it would happen in any room, it would happen in that one. Jeff Zeleny, really appreciate it. Thank you.

ZELENY: You bet.

JIMENEZ: Meanwhile, the Defense Department is now pausing its plan to carry out mass firings of civilian employees.

KEILAR: Officials are telling CNN that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Pentagon attorneys are now reviewing how those firings may break the law and impact U.S. Military readiness.

[15:05:07]

CNN's Natasha Bertrand is following these developments for us. So Natasha, bring us up to speed on what you know about this pause.

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, essentially what happened was earlier this week, the Pentagon ordered military leaders to come up with lists of thousands and thousands of civilian probationary employees who could potentially be fired because they were looking to do away with the vast majority of the probationary employees who have been there about a year or in some cases up to three years working in their jobs at the Pentagon.

As part of this broad effort by DOGE and by OPM to cut the federal workforce and, of course, cut federal spending. But what was happening was that defense officials were raising questions to their superiors about whether or not this was even legal, because there is a law in Title 10 of the U.S. Code that says that before the Secretary of Defense can carry out a mass reduction of the civilian workforce inside the Pentagon, a pretty serious analysis has to be done of whether that could harm U.S. National Security and harm U.S. Military readiness in particular.

A lot of these civilian workers, they have very important jobs. Some of them are in intelligence, cyber security, other mission critical functions that could really impact the Pentagon and the military's readiness if they are abruptly fired. And so what happened was after CNN reported on Wednesday that this was an issue that was being raised to the Office of General Counsel in the Pentagon, the lawyers started to take a closer look at it. And we are now told that they have hit pause on this plan to mass fire all of these civilian employees. There are about over 50,000 of them, until they can figure out whether this is actually legal and whether it is going to have a severe impact on U.S. Military readiness.

Now, defense officials, they had been creating lists. They had been working late into the night, we are told, before this pause occurred today, to create lists of workers who should be exempt from this mass firing because they were so concerned about the possibility that this could be very disruptive. So, it remains to be seen how long this pause is going to last. But there's clearly an awareness at the Pentagon here that they cannot afford to lose all of these critical workers and then have to try to claw them all back as we've seen at other federal agencies.

KEILAR: All right, Natasha Bertrand, thank you for the latest for us.

I'm joined now by someone who has personally felt the impact of the mass government firings that are underway. Kira Carrigan is a disabled Marine veteran. She's also a military spouse and she was fired by the Office of Personnel Management, which is essentially the government's HR department.

Kira, thanks for being with us. You were a new employee, but I know you were hoping to make a career out of government service. Just tell us why that was something that was attractive to you.

KIRA CARRIGAN, FIRED BY OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT: Yes. Thank you so much for having me, Brianna. I, you know, I served in the Marine Corps and I've followed my spouse around the country and overseas and on deployments as we've served for almost the past 18 years. And service is very much part of us and part of our family. And so, looking to, you know, further my career, it was very obvious that, you know, serving in the federal government is something that spoke to us and spoke to us personally. That was just, that's - that was there and that was what called to us.

KEILAR: And so, what was it like? What was the process like? How did it feel getting fired the way you did?

CARRIGAN: Yes. I spent eight months applying to different jobs and I was fortunate enough to get called on this interview for this position. I found out after it - that there had been four - over 4,000 applicants to this job and I got it. And I was just so thrilled, like it was literally a dream come true. For me, for my family and to just be let go the way I was with - I literally had less than 30 minutes notice from the time that I got fired by someone who didn't know me, didn't know what I did, didn't know my role in the organization until my computer access was completely locked out.

KEILAR: And, you know, the government has, broadly speaking, I don't know if people know this, but it's actually marketed itself as the employer of choice for military spouses and also for veterans, you're both. This has been true of all recent administrations: Bush, Obama, yes, Trump, and also Biden. Have you felt that personally, that as a military spouse and veteran, you were being sold on this idea of a career in the federal workforce?

[15:10:02]

CARRIGAN: Yes, absolutely. I mean, when you move as frequently as spouses - as military families do, you know, you get to some pretty remote bases that aren't near, you know, large population centers. And one of the only ways that spouses can get employment and one of the reasons why there's such high unemployment among spouses is that you're far away from a lot of places that you can work. So, one of the only ways you can is by working on base and working for the Department of Defense or working for one of the other federal agencies.

And you know, that that's there. It's, you know, you're told, like, apply here, apply to these jobs. These jobs are open. We want spouses. We want veterans to be a part of this.

KEILAR: So, I know you have small kids. You've moved four times just in the last six years, I know, and that's just the last six years. That's not all of it. But what does this mean for your family? What kind of financial security were you expecting that this job would provide your family?

CARRIGAN: Yes, so my spouse will hit 18 years this year. So, we're right at the cusp of retirement. And I knew with my youngest heading to kindergarten that now I could have, you know, a career and I could have a job that would carry our family over and bridge that gap between my spouse retiring from the Marine Corps and being able to work again. And also to give me a chance to get back into the workforce, because it's - like when you move as frequently as we do, it's hard. By the time you get settled somewhere, you're already thinking about the next time you have to leave.

So, being able to have this position that I did, which, you know, was a remote position and was something that I was going to be able to bring with me as we move again this summer is - was so big. It was literally a dream position for me and for my family. And to just have that taken away for no, you know, my supervisor even requested for me to stay and to have someone who doesn't know our jobs, doesn't know what we do to just cut just because I happened to join within the last year, it just - it's not - that's not efficient.

KEILAR: Kira, thank you for sharing your story with us. We really appreciate it. And thank you for your service, both in the Marine Corps and as a military spouse. We do appreciate it.

CARRIGAN: Thank you so much for having me.

KEILAR: Still to come, Luigi Mangione just got out of a New York courtroom facing murder and terrorism charges related to the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO. We'll have details on what happened.

JIMENEZ: Plus, buyers are worried about higher inflation. We're going to crack open the numbers on why consumer confidence dropped nearly 10 percent this month.

And later, CNN's Sanjay Gupta goes to a children's hospital in West Texas, the epicenter of a growing measles outbreak that sparked concern nationwide. That and much more coming up on CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

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[15:17:47]

KEILAR: High profile murder suspect Luigi Mangione just appeared in a New York courtroom flanked by heavy security. As you can see there, he was wearing a bulletproof vest and shackles. The 26-year-old faces murder and terror charges in the brazen fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson back in December.

JIMENEZ: Now, if you might have noticed, crowds of Mangione supporters gathered in and outside court for hours today. I mean, he's really gained hero status among some people who view the killing as vigilante justice. I want to bring in CNN's Kara Scannell, who is in the courtroom for today's hearing.

Kara, I mean, we saw some of the images of him walking in and some of his supporters outside. What happened in court today?

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, a lot of supporters, there were dozens of them packed in the hallway hoping to get one of the handful of seats open to the public inside. And when Mangione's lawyer walked onto the floor, that crowd erupted into cheers and applause. It really gives you a sense of the public's interest in this case and how big it is.

Now, inside the actual courtroom, that hearing only lasted about 20 minutes. Mangione remained shackled the whole time. His lawyers asked the judge for him to have his hands free and over security concerns. The judge denied that. The hearing was focused a lot on what some of the evidence that the prosecution has turned over.

They said they've turned over police body cam footage, surveillance video, autopsy reports, other evidence from the crime scene and cell phone records that they obtained from a phone that was found just outside the Hilton Hotel where the UnitedHealthcare CEO was gunned down.

Now, his lawyers were already starting to raise some issues that they have. They said that they believe they have some constitutional issues about the searches of Mangione's belongings when he was arrested in Pennsylvania. That is an issue they flagged to the judge. But he said he wants this to start moving forward. So he set a date for them to file their motions. Mangione will be back in court in late June. And that is when the judge says he thinks he will be able to potentially rule on some of these motions, some of the issues that his attorneys are bringing up. No trial date was set today.

His lawyer did speak outside court. She said that she has been talking to the federal prosecutors in that separate federal case that is also related to the alleged shooting.

[15:20:04]

In that case, she said that prosecutors are considering the death penalty and she is - have been providing them mitigating factors in hopes that they will not do that. She said that is where the most of her focus has been as they were leading up to this hearing today.

So, next time we'll see Mangione in state court will be in late June. He did not speak to anyone as he was led in and out of the courtroom. Just kept a straight face looking forward as he was flanked by security, guys.

JIMENEZ: All this fanfare for just a status hearing at this point that only lasted 20 minutes. Important, but not even the start of any trial here. Kara Scannell, really appreciate it.

I want to bring in legal analyst and trial attorney Mercedes Colwin now.

You heard some of what Kara was talking about as far as what we saw in court. I wonder what your reaction is to some of the fanfare we've seen in and around the court and what you make of how the proceedings were handled today.

MERCEDES COLWIN, LEGAL ANALYST AND TRIAL ATTORNEY: That's a great question, Omar, because that's exactly what the prosecutor should focus on. These are your prospective jurors. There's an overwhelming support for Luigi Mangione and they could conceivably be stealth jurors in during the prosecution as this case proceeds along to trial.

If I were the prosecutor, it would certainly start to really concern me that there is such support for him. When have we seen this type of support where even websites, there's cash flowing into the website, so he now has half a million dollars in - that he's been able to aggregate in a GoFundMe page on the website.

So, all of this is particularly troubling for the prosecution. In terms of the case, and how it proceeded in court is exactly described. This is a status hearing, nothing more, nothing less. This judge wanted to make sure that the exchange of information from the prosecution to the defense was going through and going through in such a way that there will be a speedy trial. There will be a trial. Presumably that wasn't one that was set today and that was one of the questions that was being raised that possibly the judge would have been able to set a trial. But there's so much to be done in this case. There's still motion practice that needs to be heard. That's not going to be having - happening until June. Presumably, there'll be experts and we'll have to see how it goes. We may not see a trial until early next year at this point.

JIMENEZ: And look, you talked about the fanfare. We saw some of it as well. We've seen so much of it around Mangione. He also recently put out a statement from jail saying he reads all of the letters he gets from the many people that write to him. So, I guess on both sides of this, is there a point where media strategy becomes part of the legal strategy, both for the prosecution and the defense?

COLWIN: It's a very tricky type rope to walk on. Why do I say that? If the defense is at least thinking about an insanity defense, which there - well, there's no whisper of that yet. But if during the course of continuing to have discussions with their client, they want to sort of shape this type of defense, any sort of outreach that Luigi Mangione is doing to the public will certainly diminish the likelihood of success of an insanity defense at the time of trial. Because he's outreaching. You could see he sounds coherent. He's thanking the public. He's thanking them for the support. There is a way to continue communicating with them. He's urging and encouraging people to do so that he does read the communication that he receives. All of that doesn't speak of someone that lacked their ability to understand that what took place - if, in fact, he committed the crime, obviously he's presumed innocent that he did not know what he was doing.

JIMENEZ: So, as the public follows along, prosecutors are following on just as closely, if not more, along with the defense too. But we'll see what makes it through when a trial date does come, whether in June or further beyond. Mercedes Colwin, really appreciate it.

COLWIN: Sure.

JIMENEZ: All right, just ahead, President Trump finally admits that Russia attacked Ukraine, which it did, but blames the U.S. and Zelenskyy for failing to prevent it. This as some of his top officials are in Ukraine working to reach a deal to end Russia's war there. We'll bring you the latest, coming up.

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[15:28:47]

KEILAR: Today, after facing repeated questions about who started Russia's invasion of Ukraine, President Trump finally admitted it was Russia, which is a reversal from earlier this week. But in a radio interview, Trump still blamed Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the Biden administration for not preventing the war.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Russia attacked, but there was no reason for them to attack, you could have talked him out. You - there was no reason that he should have attacked. Russia could have been talked out of that so easily.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JIMENEZ: Now, the President also said that Zelenskyy has, quote, "No cards in talks with Russia," and that it's not important that Ukraine's president be at meetings. Let's turn now to CNN Chief National Security Correspondent Alex Marquardt.

Alex, the President's posturing towards Zelenskyy, I mean, completely contradicts the words of his U.S. special envoy. I mean, what are we seeing between the two?

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, Trump just called him a dictator a few days ago, so now - we haven't heard very nice things from him. But we do hear praise from Keith Kellogg, who is dedicated to this Ukrainian track. Kellogg's just wrapping up a couple of days of meetings there in Kyiv and he posted on X at the end of these meetings that he spent time with the, what he called the embattled and courageous leader of a nation at war and his talented National Security team.

[15:30:02]

So, you have to imagine what Kellogg is telling Trump right now about how those meetings went.