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President Trump to Give Speech Addressing Congress; Kremlin Says U.S. Foreign Policy Now Aligns with Russia's; U.K. Prime Minister Says Europe Must Take Lead in Providing Security to Ukraine against Russian Aggression; State of Emergency as 175 Wildfires Burn Across Carolinas; Elon Musk's Team Using OPM as HQ for Federal Purge; Potentially 800 NOAA Workers Fired. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired March 03, 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]

DR. MEGAN RANNEY, EMERGENCY PHYSICIAN: Unfortunately, about 10 to 20 percent of parents are vaccine skeptical. I worry that we're going to have to have these kinds of outbreaks to get folks to revaccinate their kids. I do understand those fears. I worry that they've been taken in by folks who are making a lot of money off of spreading lies and distrust. I hope that outbreaks like this can help convince folks and get them to do the research in the real scientific literature where we show so clearly how safe and effective these vaccines are.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: And it is so sad that it would take something like this an outbreak, a child dying from this outbreak for people to wise up and learn the lessons here. But we are here in this moment. That is where we are. It's good to see you, Doctor. Thank you for coming in.

A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Cheers in Moscow this morning with the Kremlin saying that U.S. foreign policy now aligns with theirs. This, as leading democracies scramble to save Ukraine.

Evacuation orders and a state of emergency, more than 175 wildfires burning across the Carolinas with new severe weather on the way.

And first lady Melania Trump to use her first public remarks of this administration to talk about revenge porn. New details on what she plans to say.

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

BOLDUAN: So where is President Trump leading America next? That is a key question this morning with the nation now waiting to hear him lay out his vision during his first major address before Congress in this new term. One issue front and center, of course, Ukraine and its future as fallout over Donald Trump and President Zelenskyy's Oval Office blowup deepens. This morning, new messages are coming in from all sides of this. Zelenskyy saying that he thinks the U.S. relationship, quote, "will continue", that message after European leaders embraced Zelenskyy over the weekend and also got together, scrambled to get together to try to do damage control and to chart a course forward here to end Russia's war in Ukraine.

The British prime minister now saying that Europe is prepared to take the lead. He is confident, though, he says that America will eventually come around to the plan that they are crafting to bring Russia's war to an end.

As for the Kremlin, there are these words, "The new U.S. administration is rapidly changing all foreign policy configurations. This largely coincides with our vision," Russia's vision there. CNN has also learned that the U.S. has suspended all offensive cyberoperations against Moscow for now. And here is President Trumps latest viewpoint overnight posting this, "We should spend less time worrying about Putin."

Joining us right now is Evelyn Farkas, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Russia, Ukraine, Eurasia, and the Balkans. There is, there was a lot that happened Friday, a lot that then happened over the weekend. And as I just laid out, a lot more coming in just overnight on this, showing how important it is and kind of what a tipping point this whole situation may be at. I mean, you hear that from Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, and over the weekend, Evelyn, you had the Trump administration out largely dismissing concerns being voiced by Democrats, a few Republicans like Lisa Murkowski, and the United States's traditional allies. Let me play what Secretary of State Marco Rubio said this weekend.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARCO RUBIO, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: How does it end? It's very simple. The only way it ends is if Vladimir Putin comes to a negotiating table. And right now, President Trump is the only person on earth who has any chance whatsoever of bringing him to a table to see what it is he would be willing to end the war on. Now, maybe their claims are what they want, their demands will be unreasonable. We don't know. But we have to bring them to the table.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Evelyn, that leaves things where this morning?

EVELYN FARKAS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, THE MCCAIN INSTITUTE: Well, first of all, Kate, I think that we do know what Russia's demands are. They want control over Ukraine. They want to control them politically. They want to keep the territory. And they don't want Ukraine to be inside of NATO or really to have any meaningful security guarantee, because, again, they want to control Ukraine. So those are their maximalist objectives.

The question is whether President Trump, the United States, any other leaders can convince Vladimir Putin to compromise. We know that Ukraine is ready to compromise. So it's a delicate situation. I am alarmed, frankly, that we are giving Russia a pass, meaning our leaders are speaking to the American people trying to paint Russia as not threatening to the United States.

[08:05:07]

Let's remember, I'm sure you've covered this. You know, the Russians are sitting on our nuclear facilities. They're sitting in our grids, that President Putin himself said that his country is at war with NATO. So I think we need to maintain vigilance vis-a-vis Russia.

BOLDUAN: Let me add another voice into this. We heard from the British Prime Minister Keir Starmer about what needs to happen now after that weekend gathering in London. Let me play this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEIR STARMER, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: The U.K. is prepared to back this with boots on the ground and planes in the air, together with others. Europe must do the heavy lifting. But to support peace in our continent and to succeed, this effort must have strong U.S. backing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: And he stressed over and over again that all of this, whatever ceasefire, whatever agreement is reached, it must move forward. They must move forward together with the United States on this. How does that happen now, with the very clear animosity that that has been exposed between Donald Trump and President Zelenskyy?

FARKAS: Well, I think both sides obviously are cooling down. And I think, Kate, diplomacy is diplomacy. You work based on the interests of your nation, and you put your personal feelings about other leaders to the side, right. So it is clear that there is a possibility, of course, still for a negotiated outcome and for cooperative relationships between the United States and Ukraine. That's what the American people want.

The question is whether our country, whether the United States will provide some kind of security backstop, to use the prime minister's language, to Europe. Because Europe can maybe deter Russia, but they need to show much more political will in order to do it. And so the U.S. is the easy way to deter Russia from making another invasion into Ukraine.

BOLDUAN: Really quickly, the calls for President Zelenskyy to resign, that was another very clear go to talking point from Trump White House team over the weekend and continues to be right now. What does that inject into all of this?

FARKAS: Well, I think its disrespectful. I mean, you don't call on a democratic leader of another country to resign because he's speaking out and advocating for the interests of his nation and his people and what the Ukrainian people have basically given him a mandate to do. Having said that, President Zelenskyy said, I'll resign if you let Ukraine into NATO immediately. So he's not completely unreasonable on that score. But at the end of the day, it's not a serious thing to say. And it just seems like more personal, you know, personal fighting, if you will. BOLDUAN: Yes. It's great to see you, Evelyn. Thank you so much.

John?

BERMAN: All right, and all this is happening as President Trump prepares to address Congress and the country tomorrow night. Let's get to CNN's senior political analyst, Mark Preston. Mark, what do you expect the president to say?

MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: I think he's going to come out and he's going to say, listen, I think that Democrats I mean, they're a great party. And I think that we're all unified behind my agenda. That's clearly not what he's going to say.

Listen, he's going to go out and he is going to talk about how successful he has been in this very short time in office. He's going to talk about how bad the Biden administration has been over the past four years, probably the worst administration ever. And thank God him and his administration has come through.

But I will say this, John, a couple of things to watch for is to watch to see how far Donald Trump goes in some of his misstatements, let's say, and let's see how much he exaggerates on what Elon Musk has done so far, because what Elon Musk has said he has accomplished and the savings don't seem to add up to where they have been selling this whole idea of downsizing the federal government.

BERMAN: Look, I will say "The Wall Street Journal" has got a great article this morning with all kinds of jitters among Republicans about how Donald Trump, the president, is not addressing the economy. So I am curious to see how he addresses the economy and where that goes going forward.

Now, what about Democrats? We have a quote here from Don Beyer in "Politico," Democrat from Virginia, who's not going tomorrow night. And this is why he says he's not going. "The notion of half my colleagues rising in standing and enormous clapping for things that I think are terrible for the American people every couple of minutes will not be funny. I don't see that I'll contribute anything to the event." So how do you think Democrats are approaching this?

PRESTON: Well, to be fair, Don Beyer does represent a lot of federal workers in his district outside of Washington, D.C., and no one is ever going to beat him in a primary. But I think there's an incredible amount of pressure, though, on Democrats not to look like they are the party of opposition just to be the party of opposition, but rather the party of opposition because they believe it's better for America.

[08:10:02]

So I say that because going out and booing and acting childish I don't think is going to play well for Democrats. It doesn't mean they have to agree with what Donald Trump says tomorrow. It doesn't mean they have to applaud at all. I would just suggest that they don't go out there and take it to about a seventh grade level. We saw Republicans do that in previous years. It didn't look too good. BERMAN: All right, Mark Preston, always great to see you in

Washington. Thanks so much for being with us.

And of course, you all can watch all of this unfold tomorrow night, CNN's special live coverage of the presidential address. The live coverage begins at 8:00 p.m. eastern right here on CNN.

This morning, residents getting a first look at the damage after 175 wildfires erupted across the Carolinas.

And, quote, lives are at risk for sure, the new warning from officials as the Trump administration lays off hundreds of employees in charge of forecasting the weather.

And the heartbreaking moment on ice as a son remembers the parents he lost in the plane crash over the Potomac.

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[08:15:35]

BOLDUAN: Emergency responders in South Carolina are fighting more than 175 fires right now across the state. Several fires were also reported in North Carolina, threatening some of the areas still recovering from the disaster that was left behind from Hurricane Helene.

We're covering all of the severe weather for you with CNN's Nick Valencia live in Myrtle Beach, Derek Van Dam in the Weather Center for us.

Nick, let me start with you. What's the latest from there?

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, improving conditions here in and around Myrtle Beach, better than an hour ago. The haze has really lifted as the sun has come up, but that fire is still roaring behind me in the Carolina Forest.

The fire commission here, the fire -- South Carolina Forestry Commission, I should say -- they say that the flames are manageable and they're trying to get their hands around it. Hundreds of personnel, but they just have 30 percent containment.

You mentioned those 175 fires. This is the biggest one here at about 1,600 acres, but they're grateful that those conditions improved.

Over the weekend though, it was just a disastrous scenario here as that visibility was an issue even ten miles away, closer to the beach, they were getting ash rained on them. And they're really here in the peak of the fire season.

They were telling me about 3,000 to 4,000 fires have popped up across the state already so far this year. Most of those fires, though, are just about ten acres or smaller, and they're able to get their hands around them with those rural fire departments.

It's not just here in South Carolina that they're dealing with fires. It's also in hard hit North Carolina, where they were smacked by Hurricane Helene just a few months ago.

Now, residents there speaking to us, telling us about the conditions they're facing now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BECKY OLIVER, TRYON RESIDENT: I mean, it's bad enough from Helene. But now, we've got this and I mean, the forest -- it's just -- it's going to be really bad.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VALENCIA: Back here in South Carolina, so far, no structures have been burned, although they've been threatened. Those flames getting really close to some buildings here and some homes.

Residents were evacuated briefly, but as of about 4:30 yesterday afternoon, they were allowed to return back to their homes. But with this being the peak of fire season, officials here warning residents that things could change at any moment -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: Nick, thank you so much. Nick is in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina for us.

Let's get to Derek Van Dam, who is in the new CNN Weather Center, with much more on this. They say conditions are going to be improving, helping them out a little bit there, right -- Derek.

DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes, that's right, Kate. But certainly the last thing that Appalachia needs, especially considering Hurricane Helene from September of last year. And now, with these fires knocking on the doorsteps, of course, there is improving conditions. They were at its peak on Saturday, but they have improved since then. And now, we have a new round of extreme fire weather this time further west.

We're looking at parts of Texas and into New Mexico. This extreme fire threat today pre-empts a major storm that is going to sweep across the nation in the days to come. A whole host of hazards from blizzard conditions, the extreme fire risk, but also the severe storms threat that will follow, this cold front as it advances eastward drawing in moisture from the Gulf of Mexico, getting the spin in the atmosphere necessary for tornadic development, especially for the day tomorrow.

We're highlighting this area, Louisiana, Southern Arkansas into Mississippi as our target point for the potential of stronger storms. The potential here for EF-2 tornadoes, that's winds in excess of 111 miles per hour.

Shreveport, Jackson, you need to keep a close eye to the sky. Then the storm system advances eastward overnight Tuesday into Wednesday morning. We have a line of storms through Atlanta and then entering the eastern seaboard by the middle parts of this week.

So, this is a multi-day, severe weather setup that were facing, Kate, and this is not the greatest news considering the job cuts that have just gone through across the National Weather Service and NOAA. So, something to consider.

BOLDUAN: We'll be talking much more about that throughout this show. It's good to see you.

Thank you for that update, Derek and Nick Valencia in South Carolina for us -- John.

BERMAN: All right, "The entire organization has been corrupted." The new message this morning from former federal workers as Elon Musk orders new rounds of mass firings.

And this morning, Israel promising to block aid from reaching Gaza as they try to push their version of a new deal.

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[08:24:18]

BOLDUAN: So, many people likely had no idea what the Office of Personnel Management was before DOGE walked in. It's called OPM for short, and it is now considered really ground zero for President Trump and Elon Musk's purge plans of the federal workforce.

Officials with Musk's DOGE team are effectively now in charge of OPM, running a shadow operation for Musk, leaving career employees feeling blindsided in the process.

CNN's Rene Marsh has this new reporting for us on this. She's joining us now.

Rene, what are you learning?

RENE MARSH, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kate, it's been some time really drilling down into what is happening inside this agency that went from, as you said, an obscure agency to now driving a lot of the communications for DOGE and many current and former OPM employees describe an agency that has been captured by members of Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, and some of those DOGE appointees have deep decades long ties to Musk and his businesses and those are the individuals calling the shots.

[08:25:19]

We're told that DOGE members have isolated themselves on the fifth floor. They arrived at the agency on Inauguration Day, and soon after that top career officials had their admin authority on key data systems related to personnel information of more than two million federal workers revoked.

Those e-mails that we've reported so much about that have been sent directly to federal workers asking, what did they do last week? And also, the e-mail offering a buyout if they decided to resign, I am told that career staffers at OPM had nothing to do with these communications. They're all coming from DOGE operating on the fifth floor of the agency. Even career HR officials, I'm told, weren't even aware of the e-mail communications until they either heard about it on the news or heard about it from other employees who had received it.

And as a recently departed OPM employee tells me, they say, "The federal workers at OPM don't even know what's going on, and we are getting blamed for allowing Elon Musk and DOGE into OPM. It's very well known within the agency that it's the shadow OPM, not the career employees pushing the buttons."

Not only is OPM ground zero for Elon Musk and his vision for the federal government, though, Kate. These career employees also tell me it's the testing ground for many of those actions that we are seeing across the government. They test them first at OPM, for example, on Inauguration Day or the day after, I should say, many of those members of DOGE asked career employees to do an exercise in which they would cut some 70 percent of their workforce.

And just last week, we now see weeks later, OPM sent a memo along with OMB, asking agencies to plan for large scale reductions in its workforce. We know that Social Security Administration, for example, announced that they plan on cutting some 7,000 jobs.

So, again, not only is this agency being run essentially by DOGE, but it's also the testing ground for many of the actions that we have seen so far -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: Rene, thank you so much for your reporting on this -- John.

BERMAN: All right, one area that has been severely cut is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA for short. The agency forecast severe weather emergencies across the country. We hear a lot from them every hurricane season and their forecasts save lives.

With us now is Tom Di Liberto, former public affairs specialist and climate scientist at NOAA's Office of Communications. He was laid off last week. We're sorry for what you're going through. How did you find out you were getting fired?

TOM DI LIBERTO, FORMER PUBLIC AFFAIRS SPECIALIST AND CLIMATE SCIENTIST AT NOAA'S OFFICE OF COMMUNICATIONS. Yes, I found out on last Thursday, I got a boilerplate e-mail about 3:45 P.M. That kind of followed that -- the OPM directives that said that I'm a probationary employee, so. I can be assessed and that my skills and abilities no longer met the agency's need, which is ridiculous.

BERMAN: Talk to us about the agency and the impact that these cuts will have. I cover hurricanes every year, and I know how people depend on these forecasts. But what will the cuts -- how will the cuts impact that?

DI LIBERTO: Yes, NOAA, it stands for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. So, if you like the oceans or you are impacted by the weather, in any sort of way, which, really means everybody, you're going to be impacted by this. A ton of people got fired. That's basically going to lead to a short staffed agency that was already short staffed, now, trying to do more with less and that is just asking for a disaster to happen.

We know extreme weather is going to happen. Hurricanes, tornadoes, snowstorms and now we're asking an agency to basically try and forecast these or make the public aware of the impacts, but do it with less people. You're just asking for a mistake to happen. You're asking for burnout to occur, and it's just pointless when you look at the importance of what NOAA does.

BERMAN: You say that the cuts will actually end up costing money. How?

DI LIBERTO: Yes, so, NOAA has been well known that a dollar into NOAA leads to there being many more dollars coming out because of just exactly what NOAA does.

NOAA makes sure that people and places and communities and buildings don't suffer disasters as strongly as they otherwise would. NOAA is in charge of making sure that fishery industry is as healthy as could possibly be. It's also in charge of making sure coastal areas are not as impacted by erosion and sea level rise.

So, by basically getting rid of these things are making it more difficult for NOAA to do its job, you're basically going to cause there to be more money being spent and more damage is being felt than otherwise happening.

BERMAN: Why do you think NOAA was targeted?

DI LIBERTO: I think this is a clear, across the board attack on science. They don't like necessarily what NOAA does as it relates to climate change, and they don't like necessarily the fact that we help people because of the fact that we just help people.

There's no ulterior motives at NOAA when we're trying to help the American public. At no point at NOAA has anyone ever said we're not going to give important information, data, and resources to a community based on who that community voted for.

But we do know someone has done that. The president has done that when its related to wildfires out in California. So, I think there's a lot of issues with just the fact that we help others purely because we want to help others, and because we're trying to help people deal with increasing extremes as it relates to climate change.

[08:30:53]