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WH In Damage Control After Journalist Added To War Plan Chat; Trump Hold Ambassador Meeting Amid War Plan Group Chat Fallout; Trump: "This Was Not Classified Information" On War Plan Group Chat; Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA) Discusses About President Donald Trump's Remarks On War Plan Group Chat; Trump Expresses Support For Natl Security Adviser Who Was In Group Chat. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired March 25, 2025 - 15:00   ET

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

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: But that's certainly a subject that's been debated for a long time, and we will look into it. Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, a lot - some senators have expressed hope that the White House will support a rescission package to codify some of the DOGE cuts into law. Where does the White House stand on that? I know you're making progress on that ...

TRUMP: Which package?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A rescission package to codify some of the DOGE cuts into law.

TRUMP: You know what? That would be great. I think we're going to do that. I think they're going to do it. I think we're also going to be codifying a lot of the executive orders that we've done, which have been very popular. And we're looking at one, I will tell you right now, that I think perhaps will be controversial, but not with the people, and that's sanctuary cities. We're going to end sanctuary cities for some of these jurisdictions that aren't cooperating with law enforcement.

They're guarding criminals. They're taking the rights away from the citizens of this state and this city. And we're going to be ending sanctuary cities ...

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: We've been listening to President Donald Trump in the Cabinet Room at the White House. He was set to sign some executive orders. The President there taking questions from reporters. He talked about defunding Planned Parenthood, codifying DOGE cuts, ending taxpayer funding for NPR and PBS.

But the question about the biggest story of the day, the President dodging completely. I believe it was CNN's Kaitlan Collins who was asking President Trump about this story in which a group of senior Cabinet officials inadvertently shared sensitive war plans, sensitive information with a journalist via a Signal group chat.

The President dodging the question altogether, telling Kaitlan Collins, I didn't pick you as she was formulating the question. Our understanding from reporters in the room is that National Security adviser Mike Waltz is there in the Cabinet Room.

He, of course, was, according to Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic journalist who this information was shared with. The architect of that group chat, we'll see if he perhaps has something to say or whether Trump allows him a moment to respond to reporters' questions.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Yes. We certainly will keep an eye on that.

Jeff Zeleny is live for us at the White House.

Jeff, this is interesting. The thing we really want to hear about, he's not apparently taking questions on, at least that we've heard so far.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: In fact, as you two were speaking there, the President was asked a question about that, I am told, by our colleagues in the room, and we will have to look at that sound specifically. But I am told he talked about it extensively. He said it's a question I've been asked ...

SANCHEZ: Sorry to cut you off, Jeff. Jeff, so sorry to interrupt. We actually have that moment. So sorry, Jeff. We actually have that moment now. Let's play it back for our viewers.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, are you going to change any of the practices that your National Security officials used after a reporter was inadvertently added to a group chat about attacks on Yemen?

TRUMP: Well, I think it's a question I've been asked now, and I've given a few answers, and they've all been the same. We have an amazing group. Our National Security now is stronger than it's ever been. We have had a very, very successful, numerous attacks on that area. These are people that shoot down ships, not only our ships, ships all over the world. They're shooting down right out of the water and damaging them badly, or they're going down. They're shooting anything that happens to be flying in the area. We hit them very, very hard. There was no classified information, as I understand it.

They used a app, if you want to call it an app, that a lot of people use, a lot of people in government use, a lot of people in the media use. And I think I'll ask Mike - Mike is here - do you want to respond to that, please?

MIKE WALTZ, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Yes, Mr. President. You asked about lessons, I think there's a lot of - the lessons, there's a lot of journalists in this city who have made big names for themselves, making up lies about this president, whether it's the Russia hoax or making up lies about Gold Star families. And this one in particular, I've never met, don't know, never communicated with, and we are looking into him, reviewing how the heck he got into this room.

But I'll tell you what, the world owes President Trump a favor. Under Biden, global shipping was shut down. Pinprick attacks, months between them, our destroyers being fired upon dozens of times. President Trump took decisive action with his National Security team, took out the head missileer, knocked out missiles, knocked out headquarters, knocked out communication sites.

And for once, as we hear, as you all hear from every one of our allies, thank God for American leadership again. Thank God for American strength. You're welcome, world. (INAUDIBLE). And look, we had a National Security team that was coordinating these efforts, as Director Ratcliffe testified today.

His first day on the job, he was introduced to this app on his government systems at the CIA and at the State Department and otherwise. So look, this journalist, Mr. President, wants the world talking about more hoaxes and this kind of nonsense, rather than the freedom that you're enabling.

[15:05:08]

And a key part of our sovereignty is open sea lanes and knocking the crap out of terrorists, which is exactly what your team and Pete Hegseth, a good friend and fellow veteran, is leading the charge on and it's an honor (INAUDIBLE) ...

TRUMP: We a very, very successful - excuse me, we had a very, very successful evening, and we've had numerous successful evenings and days in that area. The Houthis are absolutely on the run. The worst of them has been killed. This should have been done a long time ago by Biden, but Biden was an incompetent president. He couldn't do anything. He wouldn't - he didn't know where he was going. He had no clue. This guy had no clue. This should have been done a long time ago as they shoot missiles at ships, randomly shoot missiles at ships and they make their own missiles.

You know, this is not an incompetent group of people. They make their own missiles. They get the missiles also from Iran. It's an offshoot of Iran. Another offshoot. You have Hamas. You have Hezbollah. You have the Houthis. You got a lot of stuff going on with Iran. And we sent a letter to Iran. You're going to have to be speaking to us one way or the other pretty soon because we can't let this happen. But that's an app that a lot of people use. And somebody got on. I mean, I happened to know the guy's a total sleazebag.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How does (INAUDIBLE) been added (INAUDIBLE) ...

TRUMP: The Atlantic is a failed magazine, does very, very poorly. Nobody gives a damn about it. It gives - this gives it a little bit of a shot. And I will tell you this, that they've made up more stories and they're just a failing magazine. The public understands that he's a very good man. That man is a very good man right there that you criticize so strongly.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: He's a very good man. And he will continue to do a good job. In addition to him, we had very good people in that meeting. And those people have done a very, very effective job. And you're going to see it. And it goes on, by the way, it's going to go on. And I think the Houthis wish that it didn't happen. But that's what it's all about.

We have to create a safe country, a safe world and that's what we're doing.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you plan to ban the use of senior officials using Signal moving forward?

TRUMP: Do I plan again to who?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The use of Signal to communicate from senior officials especially when it comes to ...

TRUMP: Well, I don't know anything about Signal. I wasn't involved in this, but I just heard about it. And I hear it's used by a lot of groups. It's used by the media a lot. It's used by a lot of the military and I think successfully. But sometimes somebody can get onto those things. That's one of the prices you pay when you're not sitting in the situation room with no phones on, which is always the best, frankly.

But you know, you - the best is to be there. In fact, oftentimes I've been - in fact, just last week, I was in the situation room with something very important. And we had a couple of people hooked up by line. And I said, cancel the line. Sorry, fellas. What you do is - we'll tell you all about the meeting, because I know people do get on those lines, whether it's Signal or anything else. Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you going to change any procedures as a result of this?

TRUMP: Well, I mean, look, we look at everything and, you know, they've made a big deal out of this because we've had two perfect months. We're bringing in - we are bringing in business. We have another one announced tomorrow, a big one, very big, like in the history of our country, nobody's ever seen anything like it.

And I think probably, a lot of people are saying it's - they started by saying it was the greatest first month that a president has ever had. And I think that's true. And now they say it's the best second month and they had to find something. And this - certainly, we'll look at this. But the main thing was nothing happened. The attack was totally successful. It was, I guess, from what I understand, took place during and it wasn't classified information, so this was not classified.

Now, if it's classified information, it's probably a little bit different. But I always say you got to - you have to learn from every experience. I think it was very unfair the way they attacked Michael. He's a good person. The person that was on just happens to be a sleazebag. So, maybe that's just coincidence. I don't know.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, what is the problem if The Atlantic released all the text messages that are not classified?

TRUMP: Well, I don't know. I'd have to ask the military about that because, you know, maybe you wouldn't want that. I don't know. I will say this, that from what I heard, the man that we're talking about, who's not somebody that I don't think most people have ever heard of. He left - he found it very boring and he left early. He got off the line very early.

So, I can't speak to it other than that. So he's made up a lot of stories. And, you know, I think he's basically bad for the country, but it's a failing venture. Very failing venture. They're very upset. And a thing like this is publicity for them.

[15:10:01]

But I don't think we should allow people that are very good like that man sitting right at the end of the table who's done a great job. We shouldn't allow them to be hurt by it.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Yes, go ahead.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you so saying you're okay with the continued use of Signal by administration officials?

TRUMP: No, that's not what I said. I said, we'll look into it. But everybody else seems to be using it. It seems to be the number one used device or app, whatever you want to call it. And we will certainly - look, if it was up to me, everybody would be sitting in a room together. The room would have solid lead walls and a lead ceiling and a lead floor. But, you know, life doesn't always let you do that.

In the meantime, the attack itself that we were talking about and discussing has been an unbelievable success.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But you will conduct an investigation is what you're saying into that?

TRUMP: We'll look into it, sure.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: I would look into it. Sure, I want to look into ...

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Without the FBI, you couldn't do that.

TRUMP: Anything like that. I would ask them. It's not really an FBI thing. It's really something having to do with security, security like will somebody be able to break in? Are people able to break into conversations? And if that's true, we're going to have to find some other form of device. And I think that's something that we may have to do. Some people like Signal very much. Other people probably don't. But we'll look into it. I think, Michael, I've asked you to immediately study that and find out if people are able to break into a system. Now, in this case, it wasn't that the - this attack was going on and nobody found out anything. And again, the person that was on, as I understand it, he left very early because he didn't find it very exciting. But I think it's something you should look into.

WALTZ: Yes, sir, we are. We have our technical experts looking at it. We have our legal teams looking at it. And, of course, we're going to keep everything as secure as possible. No one in your National Security team would ever put anyone in danger. And as you've said and we've repeatedly said, the attack was phenomenal and it's ongoing. But the media wants to talk about everything else except for the hostages you're getting out of the Middle East, Iran on its back foot, sea lanes getting reopened, peace in Europe.

As we just saw today with a Black Sea ceasefire. We were just on with Steve Witkoff, myself, our team in Saudi Arabia. They want to talk about all this other stuff except for your amazing successes and the successes of your team.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: One of the other things, and sometimes you have to move very quickly and there are other devices that are very good, but they are very, very cumbersome and you're not able to use them and - from a practical standpoint. So, we - all we can do is find out the best we have with modern technology. They'll probably get better over the years. Yes, go ahead.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sir, on the Black Sea. So, the Kremlin has said that there were several conditions --

KEILAR: All right. The headline out of this availability from Trump there in the Cabinet Room is that no heads are going to roll. And his National Security adviser, whose account is the one that invited Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic on to being a contact and then into this group to talk about this attack on the Houthi rebels. He was there and he defended the strike. He minimized the use of Signal for what appears to be classified information, certainly highly sensitive information, prospective information about a military operation. But he also seemed to say, and this was interesting, I hadn't heard this before, he said, I've never spoken with this person, meaning Goldberg, the reporter. I don't know how his number got in there.

SANCHEZ: Yes.

KEILAR: We'd heard Trump say he blamed it on a staffer ...

SANCHEZ: Right.

KEILAR: ... of Mike Waltz's, so it's - you know, what happened is - it's a big question now.

SANCHEZ: It's very clear that the President is trying to present alternative theories of how Jeffrey Goldberg got into that group chat because he repeatedly said - speculating - somebody could get on those lines. He said, we have to look into if people are breaking into those systems, you could break into almost any system is - I'm paraphrasing what the President said there. That's not what Jeffrey Goldberg did.

KEILAR: That's right.

SANCHEZ: There's no evidence that he did that. He - in his reporting makes clear that he was invited to a group chat by someone with the initials MW, ostensibly Mike Waltz ...

KEILAR: Yes.

SANCHEZ: ... and that he witnessed this entire conversation happen unfold in front of him. The other thing that I found interesting, Trump clearly trying to frame Goldberg a certain way, calling him a sleazebag, also saying that he got off the conversation early because he was bored. That's not actually what Jeffrey Goldberg did. He monitored the conversation up until the bombings started, until they happened, and then he got off in part because he didn't want to get himself, his organization or perhaps the country in trouble if by any reason a foreign adversary may have hacked his phone.

He was, in other words, paying attention to the National Security concerns of having this sensitive information out there, whether you want to call him a sleazebag for prioritizing the life and safety of service members, a separate question altogether.

[15:15:05]

KEILAR: Yes, he got off of it once he realized it was real.

SANCHEZ: Yes.

KEILAR: Right? And that's when he decided, okay, I really - I'm not supposed to be on this. And he said, Trump said of him, he made up a lot of stories called American service - we should note one of the stories that he hates of Goldberg's ...

SANCHEZ: Yes.

KEILAR: ... is that Trump called American service members suckers and losers. We know from Trump's former chief of staff, John Kelly, that is true, just to be clear.

SANCHEZ: A veteran himself, the father of a slain service member.

KEILAR: That's right. That's exactly right.

All right. Jeff Zeleny, you're there. You are tracking this. We had to interrupt you before because we got obviously word that Trump was answering those questions. What an interesting series of new talking points.

ZELENY: No question. I mean, what we've all just witnessed was the White House using the Presidential bully pulpit of which there is no equal to change the subject and send a message to Republican allies on Capitol Hill and certainly far beyond that this is not a story. This is not a concern. And changing the subject or trying to - back to the reporter Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic.

So, that was using the Cabinet Room and those - the ambassadors, some ambassador nominees to go around the room there and praise the President and then taking questions. The extraordinary thing, the President also had Mike Waltz, the National Security adviser, at the table there. So, in a sense, calling him in, we do not know what type of private conversations they had, but certainly in real time, creating the narrative and trying to change the subject.

What it does not change is the fact of what we saw and learned at the Senate hearing this morning that there was highly sensitive or classified information, one of the two. And several Republican senators said that they wanted to learn more in a closed session. We do not know if that will ever happen or if the intent to change the subject here at the White House will have the effect of moving on.

So in real time, the White House is trying to dispatch with all of this, make it a two-day story as opposed to a longer story. But that is the bully pulpit being used as we've not seen, at least in my experience here, live at the White House.

SANCHEZ: Let's actually listen back in. I believe the President has continued discussing a number of issues. Let's go back to the White House.

TRUMP: ... substantially, but down. Almost everything's down. Now, I'd like to see interest rates come down a little bit. And you're going to see billions of dollars, even trillions of dollars coming into our country very soon in the form of tariffs, because we were abused by presidents that, frankly, in all fairness, it wasn't their expertise, but they had no idea what they were doing.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, you say tariffs will create more jobs here in America.

TRUMP: Oh, yes, sure.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So, which states? Which state do you ...

TRUMP: It will be - it'll create a lot of money and more jobs. But if you look, so when the last - these gentlemen would know about it and ladies, because some of the ladies are great businessmen in this room that are becoming ambassadors. Great. Really great. Top of the line.

When you look at the number of companies that have said like we're close to, I would say close to $4 trillion. We never had numbers like that. The number one chip maker in the world from Taiwan coming in with two hundred billion dollars. We have Apple. Look at Apple, $500 billion. They're going to build plants all over the United States. They were all being built in China. You have many, many companies and maybe above all, you have the car companies coming in at levels that nobody's ever seen before.

We have - Honda is opening up one of the biggest plants in the world in Indiana. And many car companies are coming in. We have AI. We're leading China by a lot in AI. And we're going to keep it that way because we've made it very good for them. And we're going to protect them. Once they're here, we'll protect them through taxes, through incentives and also through tariffs. Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you very much. Thank you.

(CROSSTALK)

SANCHEZ: We've been listening to President Donald Trump holding a meeting with some of his cabinet members. He was set to sign two executive orders. You heard him there talking about tariffs and obviously the story of the day as well, that Trump trying to reframe this National Security snafu. Snafu is an understatement. This debacle in which ...

KEILAR: Snafu is good. I think that's ...

SANCHEZ: It's more than that. I mean, there were apparently National Security secrets communicated to a journalist ...

KEILAR: Okay, fair. That's fair.

MICHELLE MILLER:

SANCHEZ: ... that wasn't intended to be in this group chat.

KEILAR: They're trying to pass it off as a snafu.

SANCHEZ: Yes.

KEILAR: Right?

SANCHEZ: Yes. To suggest that somehow the journalist was able to break into the Signal ...

KEILAR: The Signal chat.

SANCHEZ: ... group chat. Yes.

KEILAR: That's right.

[15:20:03]

SANCHEZ: We have Congressman - Democratic Congressman Adam Smith of Washington state to discuss. He's the ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee.

Congressman, thank you so much for being patient and awaiting the President's remarks.

I wonder what you make of them.

REP. ADAM SMITH (D-WA): Well, I mean, the biggest dishonesty on display, and there's a whole bunch of different pieces to it. But Mike Waltz saying, oh, we did something the Biden administration never did. The Biden administration has repeatedly bombed the Houthis in Yemen. The problem is cutting off the source of that from Iran and getting them to stop.

So, for Mike Waltz to declare victory after one bombing campaign and to lie to the American people and to say that we haven't done this before, we've done this repeatedly over the course of the last year. What we really need are the operational details. What's different about this bombing campaign other than the ability of President Trump and Mike Waltz to dishonestly claim that it's been wildly successful a couple of days after it happened.

So, that is just dishonest about what's going on in Yemen. Also, the war has started up again under Trump's leadership here in Gaza, which is prompting the Houthis to once again start attacking shipping lines. Yes, we need to stop the Houthis, but that isn't what's happening here. It is a bombing campaign. Is it going to work? We don't know yet.

And then, it is a huge problem to reveal highly sensitive information in advance of an attack over the Signal app. And you didn't hear anything in there about what they're going to do about it. And they invited, as you pointed out, they invited Jeffrey Goldberg in.

The level of incompetence involved in this is deeply concerning because it can undermine the mission. But then to just claim, well, everything's fine because the mission was a spectacular success even though there's no evidence of that. We need honesty. We need honesty about how this mess up happened, what they're going to do to fix it and, crucially, what is the plan in Yemen other than dropping a bunch of bombs which, again, has been tried repeatedly without success.

SANCHEZ: To that point about the substance of the action itself, Congressman, President Biden took the Houthis off the terrorism designation. He essentially removed the label of terrorist group from them, which you supported. President Trump put them back on and carried out this action. Ultimately, what do you think needs to happen with this group that is backed by Iran that's been in the midst of this civil war now for more than a decade?

SMITH: Well, two things need to happen. One, we do need to militarily stop them. We need to work with partners in the region to cut off the flow of arms from Iran to the Houthis. The President is correct, the Houthis do make some of their weapons, but they rely mostly on the flow of those weapons from Iran into Yemen. So that needs to be cut off.

And, yes, we do need to attack them. And I think targeting their leadership is perfectly appropriate. But the second thing that needs to happen is there needs to be some sort of future for the Yemeni people. Putting them on the terrorist list didn't stop our ability to attack them as, again, President Biden did repeatedly to try and stop what they're doing in the Red Sea. What it does is it cuts off aid in a thousand different places and makes the Yemeni people even more desperate. And it puts the Houthis in a stronger, more powerful position. So, that's what needs to happen.

To begin with, the White House, President Trump and Mike Waltz, to lie so frequently during the course of a conversation about basic facts is stunning to me and is a huge problem in terms of getting to the right solutions. Not just on - well, on two things. One, on what do we do about Yemen, which we just outlined. Two, what do we do about the broader Middle East? But also, you guys just screwed up. You just did a classified conversation in a space that was accessible to people outside of that and you invited someone from the media into that conversation, who rightly cut himself off from the conversation when he realized that it was real, which he explains, because he realized that he wasn't supposed to be there. When he realized what was going on, he pulled himself out. So what are they going to do to address that?

SANCHEZ: Do you think, Congressman, that Jeffrey Goldberg should release the contents of the conversation if, in fact, the White House says there was no classified material shared on the Signal thread?

SMITH: In a classified setting, yes. And we've made that request. These are steps that we're taking on the Armed Services Committee. We want that information. Now, in the first place, the White House, the Department of Defense, they should give us to it - give it to us, because that is supposed to be preserved and provided to committees of oversight, which the House Armed Services Committee is. If we can't get it from the White House and DOD, then yes, we would like Mr. Goldberg to turn it over to us in a classified setting.

And again, kudos to him for not sharing that sensitive information public. But those of us who have oversight on the Armed Services Committee, we should see that information and we are asking for it now.

SANCHEZ: What can Democrats accomplish in that effort without support from Republicans?

[15:25:00]

SMITH: Well, I mean, we can expose what happened and we can put pressure on them to do the right thing, to actually exercise oversight. And the more we know about what was actually contained in that information and how it played out, it puts more pressure on Republicans to actually do their job of oversight.

Look, we had problems during the Biden administration. Secretary Austin very famously did not reveal his health condition or that he was out-of-pocket, so we did a hearing on it. We had a conversation, we brought Secretary Austin over and did it. That is oversight that needs to be done and I supported that. That was a Democratic administration.

What you are seeing, again, is excessive partisanship that is crossing over into autocracy that has no respect for laws, no respect for Congress, no respect for oversights. They do the little dog and pony show at the White House, but they don't tell the truth and they don't allow the public to understand exactly what happened and be open, honest and transparent. We need to do that whether it's Democrat or Republican in the White House.

As a Democrat, like I said, I supported it under President Biden. I think Republicans should support it now on such an obvious screw up by Donald Trump's National Security team.

SANCHEZ: And lastly, Congressman, I wanted to get your thoughts on the CIA director John Ratcliffe testifying that Signal was already loaded on his computer when he was confirmed as CIA director. He said that it was a practice ...

SMITH: Sure.

SANCHEZ: ... that was apparently - using that app was a practice that was apparently underway well into the Biden administration. What do you think of that?

SMITH: There are contexts within which, yes, Signal app can be fine for different conversations. There is no context under which you discuss active war plans, specific targets and specific ordinance in advance of the attack. Just because the Signal app exists at the CIA, there's a whole - I have the Signal app for a variety of different reasons, but one of them is not to discuss classified information.

So, the mere fact that the CIA has the Signal app doesn't prove that somehow this was accepted practice. And I can assure you it is not accepted practice. And a good place to start would be for Mike Waltz, and Pete Hegseth and the President to at least be honest about that point instead of directly lying to the American people.

SANCHEZ: Congressman Adam Smith, we have to leave the conversation there. Appreciate you sharing your point of view.

SMITH: Thanks for the chance.

SANCHEZ: Stay with CNN Central. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)