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Federal Judge Receives No Answers from Justice Department to Questions about Organizational Structure of Department of Government Efficiency; Republican Congressman Experiences Contentious Town Hall with Constituents after Mentioning Elon Musk. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired February 25, 2025 - 08:00   ET

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

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JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The new Republican Congressman won by just 2,000 votes. His 2026 reelection prospects will likely hinge on Trump's performance, on whether swing voters here see the president as focused on the big issues or veering too far off target.

John King, CNN, Greeley, Colorado.

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JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: So new this morning, the president says millions of federal workers are at risk of getting semi-fired, whatever that means. Now, his administration says they're not at risk at all. Elon Musk says they will get completely fired. So does that clear things up?

Newly unsealed court documents reveal disturbing new details about the murders at the University of Idaho that left four students dead. A never before heard account from a surviving roommate detailing what she heard that day.

And a highway overpass collapses, killing at least four people. Rescue operations now underway.

Kate is out today. I'm John Berman with Sara Sidner. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Who is in charge? Is there a new deadline to answer Elon Musk's email? What does "semi-fired? even mean? This morning, way more questions than answers after Musk said he was giving millions for federal workers another chance to justify their jobs or risk losing their jobs. But whether or not they really have to is still a big question mark this morning, as Trump officials send varying guidance on what they're supposed to do.

Also, demanding answers, a federal judge who is right now weighing whether Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, as he calls it, is even constitutional. CNN's Katelyn Polantz is covering the very latest in this DOGE legal dilemma. Say that three times. Katelyn, what are you learning? There's so much going on here.

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: Sara. What aren't we learning? Because the Justice Department just doesn't have answers at this point to speak about what DOGE is and what Elon Musk is doing, what role he has, what power he has, and where the people who are working with DOGE at agencies across the government, especially the Treasury Department, where they handle those sensitive payment data, where they're getting their direction from.

The question at a hearing yesterday, for about 30 minutes there was a grilling by a judge of a Justice Department lawyer. And the overarching question was, what is DOGE? And the Justice Department just didn't have answers. At one point, the judge even said to the lawyers in the room, if anybody knows any of the answers here, speak up. Silence.

The questions from Judge Kollar-Kotelly. Where is Mr. Musk in all of this? Is there an administrator of USDS? That's the U.S. Digital Service, now DOGE at the present time. Rhetorically, she asked, who is involved? Who is in charge? Who is giving them direction? I would hope by now we would know the structure.

The reason this is important is because people are going to court, and they're asking judges to take extraordinary action, emergency intervention, to lock down data agencies, like in this case, at the Treasury Department. And the judges just don't have enough facts to muster them to do anything right now.

So Judge Kollar-Kotelly, in this case, she explained pretty late into this hearing that this matters, because if people at the Treasury Department are working with DOGE and taking direction from someone, be it Musk, be it from the White House, that person needs to be nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate, not just some random person installed in power. And there just are not enough clear answers of the chain of command from Musk to people working with DOGE at agencies like the Treasury Department, even if those people report to the secretary or another top confirmed official.

The White House here, they have been no help either. There have been many questions put to them, including by CNN's Kaitlan Collins. Here is what Donald Trump said last week when he was asked, what exactly is Elon Musk?

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DONALD TRUMP, (R) U.S. PRESIDENT: Elon is to me, a patriot. So, you know, you could call him an employee. You could call him a consultant, you could call him whatever you want. But he's a patriot.

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POLANTZ: Patriot is not an official title. But when asked in court yesterday, the Justice Department said that Elon Musk was, quote, "an adviser" to the president. That's all we've gotten at this point. Sara? SIDNER: I think it says it all, what you just said. Patriot is not an

official title. Katelyn Polantz, thank you so much. Appreciate all of your reporting, and I'm sure it will get even more detailed as time goes on.

John Berman?

BERMAN: All right, new overnight, jeers from angry constituents at a Missouri town hall with Republican Congressman Mark Alford the second he mentioned Elon Musk.

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REP. MARK ALFORD, (R-MO): Elon Musk has contracts with the federal government.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There you go.

ALFORD: But he is also, I think, doing an effective job --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Conflict of interest.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Show me, show me.

ALFORD: I think there are a lot of people who don't want see waste, abuse, and fraud weeded out. Some of them are here today.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't want him in charge of it.

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BERMAN: So you could hear the pushback that Alford got there. He won that district by 45 points in the last election. So on theory that Republican congressman was on friendly turf.

With us now is "Axios" senior contributor Margaret Talev. Margaret, great to see you. And we just saw that at the end of last week with Rich McCormick in Georgia. We're starting to see this kind of reaction bubbling up around the country. What do you make of it?

MARGARET TALEV, SENIOR CONTRIBUTOR, "AXIOS": I mean, I think it's a really important indicator, John. And what we've always seen from the start is that President Trump's approval numbers were higher than Elon Musk's. Elon Musk didn't get elected president. But Musk's favorability, or approval, started out pretty high just before the start of the administration, or in the very early days. And we're beginning to see not just in Missouri at this town hall meeting, but in national polling, a real dip where he's underwater, as they say, and his disapproval numbers, Musk's, are higher than his approval numbers.

We're also beginning to see a rise in the disapproval or strong disapproval numbers for President Trump. So there's the potential that Elon Musk will be dragging the president's reputation down among those voters who voted for Trump because they wanted to see a change, but they just didn't want to see it this way. So that's, it's sort of an important indicator to watch.

And again, I still think it's early, but what you're looking at is on the front of the federal workers who are being impacted, so much confusion. You've got the Office of Personnel Management saying this DOGE demand is voluntary. Then you've got Musk doubling down and saying, I'll give you another chance, but you really still might get fired if you don't respond. You've got HHS saying that malign foreign actors are probably going to be reading whatever you write, so if you decide to voluntarily fill out the form, don't say anything very specific.

And then you've got these members of Congress who are very worried inside the Republican House conference, very, very worried about primary challenges from the president if they don't act as an ally to him. But I think a little bit less worried about primary challenges if they turn cold to Elon Musk. And so that's the space that I'm looking at. I think when you've got constituents showing up consistently at meetings and strong red districts expressing concern about Musk, and that is driving disapproval, potential disapproval of President Trump, that's going to be an important trend to watch.

BERMAN: Yes. You make so many important points there. Number one, it is early, but something is beginning to happen, we think, based on what we're seeing, this disapproval of Musk, also a disapproval of job cuts that affect specific communities. It's a NIMBY thing, not in my backyard type of thing. We're seeing that. And we're also seeing people kind of turn on the idea of chaos, which clearly is visible every day because we're just not getting answers to who is in charge, things like that.

But in "Axios" this morning, your friends at "Axios" this morning were writing, and I think it was Mike Allen in his piece, were saying, in general, this is a bargain that the administration is willing to make because they think that the country at large likes the idea of cuts, right, trimming government, and also likes the look of going after big government, attacking government.

TALEV: That's certainly and indisputably true for the Republican base, for the MAGA base. It is largely true for voters who are sort of in the center, center right space. And it's not as true for Americans in the sort of center and center left spaces. But it's those words that you use when we are listening to focus groups, talking with voters, looking at polling, we see consistently not only that Americans want to tackle the ideas of waste, fraud, and abuse, but they really believe that -- there's a large contingent of Americans who believe that it is pervasive in American government, and that if you just, like, lopped off a bunch of these jobs, you'd get a lot of money savings, that it would somehow reduce peoples tax bill.

So I think there is a rubber meets the road moment that we're nowhere close to right now where I think people think this is going to happen and they will be paying less taxes and government will work better. If that doesn't happen, or when that doesn't happen, people may revisit their views on whether this was worth it, especially if their communities are impacted by these job cuts.

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BERMAN: So finally, Margaret, this is becoming sort of a semi- obsession, which is that Donald Trump is so focused on these government cuts, so focused on going after Volodymyr Zelenskyy, so focused on going after DEI, but we don't hear him talking about inflation. We don't hear him talking about day-to-day economic matters. Do you have any sense of why that could be when clearly it's beginning to have an impact on him in the polls?

TALEV: Because it's really hard to reduce inflation just by talking about stuff, and especially if you're going to throw tariffs into the mix. There could be some short-term stresses on the economy that pulls it in the other direction. I think he's moving the conversation to where he wants it to be in part because it's very hard to translate the sort of positive instant results. I mean, eggs or whatever, a zillion dollars a dozen now. This stuff is really complicated. Turns out presidents can't just wave a magic wand and change the pricing structure for everything, for the goods that people consume.

BERMAN: Yes, but people, I think, are starting to wonder, why aren't you talking more about me and my everyday life? We'll see if he pivots a little bit in the next few days, especially as he gets to the State of the Union or his address to Congress.

Margaret Talev, thank you so much. Great to see you this morning.

All right, new reaction after President Trump was fact checked in real time by the French president.

And a new update from NASA on the asteroid making its way towards earth, dubbed the, quote, riskiest asteroid on record.

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SIDNER: This morning, criticism coming sharp and pointed at President Trump after the U.S. aligned with Vladimir Putin voting against a U.N. Resolution condemning Russia's war on Ukraine in the third anniversary of the war.

That's happening as President Trump met with French President Emmanuel Macron at the White House. You see them there yesterday, the moment highlighting the stark contrast in approach the United States and European nations are taking to try and bring an end to the war.

Joining us now, CNN global affairs analyst, Kim Dozier and Jill Dougherty, former CNN Moscow bureau chief and author. We will talk about that later, in just a bit.

But Kim, first, can we just take a step back and look at the clear, unequivocal reversal of everything the United States has stood for when it comes to Russia and its relationship with Russia and now vis- a-vis Ukraine? They wouldn't even agree to a resolution that supports Ukraine. What are we seeing here?

KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Yes, at the U.N., the U.S. voted with Russia, Belarus and Sudan against the rest of the U.N. members who were condemning Russia's aggression in Ukraine. So, it is this through the looking glass universe.

And now, the U.S. is saying, you have to pay us back for money the Biden administration pledged with future earnings not just from your rare earth minerals, but from just about all of Ukraine's output to the tune of Ukraine paying back $500 billion.

I'm going to do a Daniel Dale style fact check here for a minute. The U.S. has pledged $183 billion and has only given out about half of that. The EU has pledged -- between the EU, Norway and U.K., they've pledged $207 billion and given out $166 billion, so they're way ahead of us and Ukraine being asked to pay this back to the U.S., the EU isn't asking Ukraine to pay anything back.

SIDNER: Yes and some of that money, of course, goes back to U.S. companies who are supplying the weapons and the ammunition.

Jill, now to you, you are literally writing the book on Russia. We know that the leadership is celebrating what has been a gift to them. From the words of Donald Trump, blaming Ukraine for starting the war, when indeed Russia was the one that started this war. But what might Putin do with this sort of new goodwill from an American president?

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN RUSSIAN AFFAIRS CONTRIBUTOR: Well, I think what he wants is a restoration of Russia and himself back at the table. Russia being a decider in the world. The isolation that Russia was in after it invaded Ukraine over.

They're even talking about economic relationship restored with the United States. And I should add, at the very time that Russia has been nationalizing western companies they are now talking about investments.

So, I think it's a bigger picture. You know, Ukraine is really important. Ukraine is something that President Putin is fixated on and has been for a long time. But I think on top of that, the most important thing to him is this relationship with the United States and the role of Russia in the world.

And I think, we should -- we could talk about this more, but we should watch what Russia is doing with China, because at the very moment that all of this was going on at the U.N., Putin was talking with President Xi of China, and they're saying our no limits partnership continues. It's for a long time.

And notably, they said no other party can interfere in that relationship. And that means the United States, because charitably, if you look at what Trump is doing, what they're trying to do is it appears, pull Russia toward the United States and then as a move against China. But I think it goes way beyond that. And, you know, it's obviously very controversial.

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SIDNER: Yeah, I mean, a lot of people look at it -- it's like Putin is a former KGB he plays chess, not checkers, and is questionable as to what game Donald Trump is playing at this point.

I do want to go to this remarkable moment between President Trump and Emmanuel Macron, when he basically, you know, factchecks, Donald Trump in real time on the world stage. Take a listen.

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DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Europe is loaning the money to Ukraine. They get their money back.

EMMANUEL MACRON, PRESIDENT OF FRANCE: No, in fact, to be to be frank, we paid we paid 60 percent of the total effort. And it was -- like the U.S. loans, guaranteed grants and we provided real money, to be clear.

TRUMP: If you believe that, it's okay with me.

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SIDNER: Kim, can you just talk about this moment? I mean, he reaches over and almost, like, pats him on the knee like, no, you're incorrect.

DOZIER: Yes, it's kind of like you do with a grandfather whose hearing aids aren't working properly and you're like, you didn't quite hear that right.

The fact of the matter is, the European loans, the collateral on them is the proceeds of the frozen Russian assets that Europe holds. But Ukraine still has to pay those loans back. Same goes for the G7 loans. It's just amazing.

It feels like, Macron is having to factcheck the misinformation without calling it that, because we all know how triggering that would be for Trump.

SIDNER: Yes, I mean, we saw what happened when Zelenskyy said that Trump was living in a disinformation space and suddenly, Trump is calling him a dictator.

Jill, I am curious just quickly here when it comes to this sort of conversation. We have seen Donald Trump lash out. What do you make of what might happen to Macron after that situation that played out in front of everybody?

DOUGHERTY: Well, Macron goes back to France and, the allies right now, the E.U., all of Europe is essentially most of Europe, except for Hungary is trying to unite to -- literally deal with the world in which the United States is no longer a guarantor or maybe even a participant in anything dealing with European security. And that is stunning and it's stunning in the speed with which its happening.

So, the Europeans are very, very worried. And that was why Macron came here. By the way, the UK Prime Minister will be here, Keir Starmer, he'll be here I think it's on Thursday and they are all trying to convince President Trump that even if President Trump is trying to negotiate, let's again, say this is all part of negotiations. It's very dangerous when you really do appear to be siding with one side. And that is Vladimir Putin.

So it's a full court press and then also trying to figure out how they, protect Ukraine and protect European security.

SIDNER: Yes, this might bring Europe together in a way we have not seen before, a much stronger alliance there that might be part for Europe, a silver lining.

Jill Dougherty, Kim Dozier, it is always such a great pleasure to be able to talk to you, appreciate you both.

All right ahead, will President Donald Trump's popularity be able to help the House push that big budget plan over the finish line?

And new details this morning on the murder of four Idaho college students. Defense lawyers calling into question how investigators used DNA genealogy sites to find the suspect, Bryan Kohberger.

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BERMAN: All right, this morning, never before seen court documents have been unsealed in the murder case concerning four University of Idaho students.

The defendant, Bryan Kohberger, is accused of stabbing the students to death in an off campus home in November of 2022.

CNN's Jean Casarez has been covering the story from the beginning and has these new details this morning.

Good morning.

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, so much of this case has been shrouded in secrecy and it's to protect the potential jury pool so Bryan Kohberger has a right to a fair trial. But a transcript was just released from a very important hearing and what we do know is that the victims were stabbed multiple times, four victims to death on November 13th.

We know following that, that they found a knife sheath, no murder weapon, but a knife sheath under the body of Madi Mogen. They swabbed the button snap of that knife sheath and found unknown single source male DNA. And that's really where this all starts, because that was given to Othram Genetic Genealogy Laboratories in Houston, Texas, November 22nd.

They started genetic genealogy work on this unknown DNA, and we learned for the first time through a defense witness on the stand in this transcript that Othram Laboratories went generations back and found a small bit of that unknown DNA on great grandparents far removed.

And then they went back the other way to present day, and they found four brothers. They released the case to the FBI in December 10th, saying, look into these four brothers. And their last names were not Kohberger.

The FBI reached out to one of the brothers because they wanted that DNA to go into the public databases that law enforcement can search. The brother said, "Just stop bothering me. I'm not going to do it.

FBI did their own work on this, and on December 19th, that is when the name Bryan Kohberger from genetic genealogy was first announced to Idaho law enforcement.

We have a quote here, Brett Payne, who was the -- is the lead investigator, said that was a result of investigative genetic genealogy that was being undertaken by the FBI.

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