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Interview with Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL): U.S. Intel Chiefs Back on Capitol Hill Amid Group Chat Fallout; Use of Civilian App for Military Planning Raises Questions; Hegseth Again Denies Texting War Plans in Chat on Unclassified App; Five Senior CDC Leaders Depart Agency Ahead of Anticipated Cuts; Crime Ring Targets Surfers, Draining Accounts and Maxing Credit Cards. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired March 26, 2025 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: This morning, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is doubling down again, denying he sent classified war plans to a group chat on an unclassified app, a chat that a journalist was accidentally added to. Hegseth saying, quote, I know exactly what I'm doing. The secretary did not answer questions about whether he had declassified any information before putting it in that group chat.

The secretary speaking after top intelligence officials shifted responsibility onto him for what was shared in those texts. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said during a Capitol Hill hearing yesterday that no classified material was sent, but she struggled to respond to sharp questions from Democrats.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TULSI GABBARD, U.S. DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: There was no classified material that was shared in that --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So if there was no classified material, share it with the committee. You can't have it both ways. These are important jobs. This is our national security.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: They have not shared that information yet. Both Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe are will be back on Capitol Hill today in a few hours to answer more questions, this time from the House Intelligence Committee.

Illinois Congressman Mike Quigley sits on that committee and joins us right now.

Let's start with this. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has continued to deny texting war plans, saying that it's not, you know, high secret intelligence. Based on what you've seen and heard so far, is this information classified or should it be?

REP. MIKE QUIGLEY (D-IL): Well, it certainly should have been. You're talking about a military operation, who, what, when, why, where and how of that military operations. That information is released. The success of the operation is at risk. The people participating in that operation are put at risk, including U.S. personnel.

So look, anyone else of lower rank would be out by now. This is inexcusable. This is what happens when you put inexperienced, frankly, sycophants in charge of the military and the intelligence community. People who are out to settle scores like Kash Patel, people who have cozied up to dictators like Tulsi Gabbard, they're in over their head. And as a result, we're less safe.

SIDNER: I just want to make sure you're OK. I hear some sort of yelling, I think, in the background. Are you safe where you are right now?

QUIGLEY: My colleague, Mr. Jordan.

SIDNER: Oh, all right.

QUIGLEY: That's my colleague, Mr. Jordan.

SIDNER: You can bring him over and maybe we can ask him some questions. All right. All right.

Waltz -- I want to sort of play what Waltz had to say about this investigation. And and who is responsible for this?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE WALTZ, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: I just talked to Elon on the way here, we've got the best technical minds looking at how this happened. But I can tell you, I can tell you for 100 percent, I don't know this guy.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You don't know what staffer is responsible for this right now.

WALTZ: Well, look, a staffer wasn't responsible. And look, I take full responsibility.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: So if he takes full responsibility, what should happen to him?

QUIGLEY: Well, look, he should be gone, too. But look, they all know they're on a commercial app talking about an extraordinarily important, dangerous military operation. There's simply no excuse.

But I guess I shouldn't be worried because someone's going to get a good scolding here. The fact of the matter is they have to treat this information carefully, not just because of those involved and the success of the operation. It's much bigger than that as it relates to our safety is. Who is going to trust us with this information.

We formed ODNI in the first place post 9-11 to encourage information sharing after the failure of such before 9-11. We did this to avoid another 9-11, to encourage sharing within the intelligence community, but also with our allies. What ally is going to trust us now when such incompetence is bore before the whole world?

Those sources and methods are important to their security as well. They realize if they were to give us information and we talk about it on a commercial app, anyone of lower rank on this would already be fired by now.

[07:35:00]

They'd be out of the military because it's such a dangerous action that was committed. And the fact that no one's taken responsibility other than, oops, I'm sorry, just shows that they have a disdain and a lack of concern for what these offices do.

SIDNER: I do want to ask you, what can be done about it? What can Democrats do about it, being that you are not in control of the House or the Senate at this point? And so far, the president standing behind them so far, some Republicans seem to be very much standing behind them and using other excuses for what happened, even blaming the app itself and the app saying we had nothing to do with this. You added the reporter. It wasn't nothing to do with what how things work.

So what can Democrats do about this right now?

QUIGLEY: Look, I think all you can do now is use your voice and your vote. And my voice is telling the American people this incompetence is making you less safe. And draw out all the details that we will again today in the open hearing before the Intelligence Committee.

The fact of the matter is we recognize we can only call for an investigation. We can only let the American people know what's taking place and draw attention to the fact that the Republicans are doing nothing about it.

SIDNER: Representative Mike Quigley, thank you so much for enduring my questions, but also for enduring the loudness that was next to you earlier. We will talk to you in a bit.

QUIGLEY: I'm used to it here. Thank you.

SIDNER: Me too -- John

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: You get two interviews for the price of one right there, right?

So this morning, it goes without saying the messaging app Signal is in the news in ways few ever imagined, because few ever imagined it would be used by Cabinet secretaries to discuss a military attack with a reporter listening in.

Obviously, there are questions about how it all works, Signal that is. One person can answer that question, and it's Clare Duffy is here. So what makes Signal in theory special for normal consumers, not like military planners? CLARE DUFFY, CNN BUSINESS WRITER: Yes, so Signal on the front end for users looks a lot like other messaging apps like WhatsApp or iMessage, but the back end of it makes it more private. So first of all, it's owned by a nonprofit, not a big tech giant. That helps.

Messages are end-to-end encrypted. So when they're traveling between users' devices, they're essentially scrambled so nobody in the middle could see them. And Signal just retains less metadata than a lot of other messaging services.

So if someone were to hack into their systems or subpoena them for information, they just have less they can turn over. Not only do they not have the content of messages, but they also don't have information like a user's location. But as you said, this is not government or military-grade technology.

Signal has end-to-end encryption, but it can't control the security of those end-users' devices and it can't control who users decide to message on the app or who they're adding to conversations.

BERMAN: Yes, and one of the questions being raised here, Steve Witkoff was in Russia while he was there. Is it possible they could have been listening in at that time? That's one question. How safe is it from spying eyes? The other question is, you know, what are the verification procedures? If you do invite someone so you can make sure it's going to the intended person?

DUFFY: Yes, I mean, look, it's a lot like any other group message. We've all had group messages. You can see who the recipients are. If you click in to see the recipients of the group message, you can remove people from the message. Those are just basic things that anybody can do on a group message. You have a birthday conversation, you want to make sure the birthday girl's not in the chat.

But look, there also are extra features like this safety number feature that Signal offers, which is for really individual conversations, but to make sure that the person you're messaging is who they say they are. But at the end of the day, it is incumbent on users to engage those features.

BERMAN: Clare Duffy, thank you for that. Appreciate it -- Kate.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Coming up for us, a major shakeup at the CDC. One day after President Trump nominates a new director there, five senior leaders at the agency resign.

And a string of high end robberies targeting surfers. And now a question of it's linked to an organized crime ring.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LOGAN DULIEN, "SNAPT" SURF FILM DIRECTOR: I'm not a fighter. I'm not tough or whatever, but I wanted to draw blood as far as, like, they got me, then I want to get them back.

(END VIDEO CLIP) [07:40:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: All right, very shortly, several of President Trump's top national security officials, cabinet officials, will be back on Capitol Hill. They will face new questions about discussing secret military plans in a group chat. This comes as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said this overnight.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETE HEGSETH, DEFENSE SECRETARY: Nobody's texting more plans. I know exactly what I'm doing, exactly what we're directing, and I'm really proud of what we accomplished, the successful missions that night and going forward.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: All right, with us now, CNN senior military analyst, former NATO Supreme Allied Commander Admiral James Stavridis. He is now a partner at the Carlisle Group, a global investment firm. His new book, "The Admiral's Bookshelf", was just released.

Admiral, thank you so much for being with us. You just heard the Defense Secretary say again, nobody's texting war plans. We heard a full day yesterday of people trying to assert, then semi-walking back that there was nothing classified on this text exchange.

But I want to remind people what Jeffrey Goldberg reported. There was targeting information, weapons information, and timing information all reportedly in this exchange before the attack took place. So how do you align all those various claims?

No war plans, not classified, yet targeting information before the attack.

[07:45:00]

ADM. JAMES STAVRIDIS, CNN SENIOR MILITARY ANALYST: I just do want to draw a line under one thing he said that's absolutely correct, which is we ought to be proud of the military members who conducted those strikes. They apparently did go off flawlessly. We ought to be proud of that. I agree with him on that one.

The first part, not texting war plans, is just inexplicable to me. It's a war. We are dropping bombs. They are plans. These are planning elements, at least as reported thus far. John, I think it's going to have to be released if it's truly unclassified. And then we can all take a look at it and make judgments.

But certainly, as the reporter describes it, to me, that sounds like planning for combat operations. I think you can call that a war plan.

BERMAN: There is a possibility here that, this is all semantics, that the White House and these Cabinet officials are saying it wasn't classified because the Secretary of Defense has classification authority, even retroactive. So if Pete Hegseth says it wasn't classified now, by definition it's not classified. But I'm just not sure that gets to the issue of how sensitive the information was.

STAVRIDIS: No, it does not. And as we look at the fallout from this, again, operationally, yes, it went well. But the real point here is a broken process that could have put our people at extreme risk, that has revealed to our allies some, let's face it, some pretty harsh comments that we wouldn't want out there publicly ascribed to very senior officials. And it's created real vulnerabilities for our opponents.

What I'm hoping to hear in the hearings today, John, is where exactly are those cell phones right now that were on that Signal? How many previous times had they been used for classified information or conversations like this? Can we assume that everything this group has done over the last two months has been done on Signal?

Step one would be simply to gather up every one of those cell phones, put them in a lead-lined locker somewhere, and let the FBI start taking this apart so we can understand what has been exposed. All of those are very real vulnerabilities in national security, and they don't have anything to do with the fortunate success of the mission.

BERMAN: Yes, you raise good points there and good questions. We will see if those get asked. I should note there is no indication that there is an FBI investigation of any kind or that any steps have been taken to gather those cell phones, at least not that we know of. We'll see if they answer those questions.

You brought up the success of this mission and the soldier, sailors and airmen who carried it out. What message does it send to them, all of them, going forward?

STAVRIDIS: I think first and foremost, the sailors, and these are largely sailors operating off Navy carriers, you know the Admiral is going to say that, and we're not in the boots on the ground situation, which is a good thing. They're all proud today. They're feeling good about the mission. That goes almost without saying, but I'll say it anyway.

But secondly, I think they do look at what to them sounds like a lot of white noise around this, and they are perplexed at how classified, what appear to them to be highly classified material, can be shared in a manner that now is revealed to the public. Because we spend -- we very senior people in the department, spend endless amounts of time appropriately telling our young sailors and Marines and Army, don't reveal classified information.

And I assure you, if this had been Major and Captain and young lieutenants who had been on a chat and revealed a bunch of classified information, they would be prosecuted. They would probably lose their commissions.

So I think there's, on the one hand, good feelings about the strike and the conduct, and there are going to be more. On the other hand, there is a very perplexing moment out there for young people in the military about this whole idea of protecting classified material.

BERMAN: Admiral James Stavridis, what I liked most was your unprompted praise of your own branch of the military there. Thank you very much for that. The least surprising thing ever. Great to see you this morning -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: And he is allowed that.

BERMAN: Yes.

BOLDUAN: He's earned it.

Today, literally live pictures of Baltimore right now. Today marks one year since the Francis Scott Key Bridge crumbled into the river in Baltimore. The shocking collapse left six construction workers dead that day.

[07:50:00]

And today, Maryland's Governor Wes Moore, state lawmakers and others will be holding a commemoration ceremony to honor them. Governor Moore, he was on with us yesterday and he said that he wants families to have some closure.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. WES MOORE, (D) MARYLAND: I said, I made a pledge that very first morning that we were going to bring closure and comfort to the families of the victims, that we were going to reopen the federal channel. And when people said it would take 11 months, we got it done in 11 weeks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: You will recall a container ship the size of a New York skyscraper ran into the to the bridge causing its collapse that day. A disaster also temporarily shut down one of the nation's busiest ports.

So authorities in Costa Rica, they now say that they have ruled out asphyxiation as the reason for the tragic death of the teenage son of former Yankees star Brett Gardner.

Preliminary reports had suggested there that the cause of death could be, quote, asphyxiation due to intoxication related to food poisoning. Well, now further testing has determined 14 year old Miller Gardner's airway was not obstructed. Medical examiner now says it's focusing the investigation solely on food poisoning. The entire family says that they all suddenly got sick after going out to dinner while on vacation there.

A firefighting pilot is one of at least 24 people dead now, dozens more injured as unprecedented wildfires continue to burn. This is in South Korea. They've spread across -- the fires -- nearly 43,000 acres. The country's Interior Safety Ministry says 13 -- a 1,300 year old Buddhist temple has been destroyed in the fires. And the flames are also threatening several more historic sites -- Sara. SIDNER: All right, thank you, Kate.

This morning, critical steps towards implementing RFK Jr.'s public health agenda as the Senate signs off on President Trump's pick to lead the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health.

It's all happening as we're learning of anticipated cuts to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is already prompting some high ranking leaders at the agency to head for the exit.

CNN medical correspondent Meg Tirrell is here to explain this. Less people that have very good information could be a real problem. Give us some sense of what's happening here.

MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Sara, we learned that five key division leaders at CDC are set to depart. And these are folks who lead agencies like the Public Health Infrastructure Center, which is responsible for disseminating funding and technical assistance to local health departments.

The head of the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities. They research things including autism, which is a stated priority of this administration to better understand it.

The Office of Science, the Office of Policy Performance and Evaluation and the Office of Health Equity, all five of those leaders set to depart, we learned yesterday.

This comes as folks at the CDC are bracing themselves for potentially extremely deep cuts. One person familiar with the -- at least a draft of the plans said they could be cuts of the workforce up to 30 percent. And one staffer I spoke with said that colleagues expect perhaps those offices really could be hit particularly hard by these cuts. But really, they're worried about entire departments at CDC potentially being wiped out in this reorganization.

And Sara, this comes as we also saw yesterday an opinion piece published by the former director of communications at the CDC. His name's Kevin Griffiths. He left the CDC late last week and published this opinion piece yesterday in The Washington Post, where he really excoriated Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

He said, quote: My firsthand experience over the recent troubling weeks convinced me that Kennedy and his team are working to bend science to fit their own narratives rather than allowing facts to guide policy. He said that the U.S. government now is spreading bad information and the country needs a different source of good health information.

This, of course, Sara, as we're dealing with the measles outbreak, the threat of bird flu, many other public health threats, we are bracing ourselves to see what these cuts to the CDC look like. Back to you.

SIDNER: Yes. Thank you so much, Meg Terrell. You've been on this from the beginning and every single day there seems to be something different that happens. Thank you, we really appreciate it -- John.

BERMAN: All right, new this morning. Surf's up. Crime's up. Police in Southern California say a sophisticated crime ring is targeting surfers for car keys, wallets, phones and more.

CNN's Nick Watt has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LOGAN DULIEN, "SNAPT" SURF FILM DIRECTOR: I'm not a fighter, I'm not tough or whatever, but I wanted to draw blood as far as, like, they got me, then I wanted to get them back.

NICK WATT, CNN REPORTER (voice-over): It's August 12th, Newport Beach, California. Logan Dulien parks, stashes his car keys at his beachfront crash pad. He has no idea he's being watched.

DULIEN: I thought, I'm going to go surf 20-minute saltwater therapy.

[07:55:00]

WATT (voice-over): The guy who watched him stash those keys waits for word from an accomplice on the beach that Logan has paddled out, snatches Logan's keys, opens the car, steals wallet and phone, locks the car and leaves.

Minutes later, Logan is looking in vain for those keys. Within an hour, thieves are hammering his credit cards at a bunch of high-end stores.

WATT: It would seem a bit odd, like, a surfer dude who's never shopped at Chanel suddenly dropping bank at Chanel.

DULIEN: Look at me, I mean, I got no Rolexes or any gold jewelry on or anything. They send a notification, fraud alert, was this you? And the guy's sitting there on the phone, he'd just write yes, so the charges would keep going through.

WATT (voice-over): Thieves were clearly breaking into phones. An accomplice would later flip, telling federal agents he saw the alleged ringleader with stolen phones in a Faraday bag and understood that the bag was to prevent victims from wiping or tracking their stolen cell phones.

They drained all Logan's accounts, maxed out all his cards. Total loss, more than $150,000.

DULIEN: And I'm just sitting there kind of deteriorating, like, emotionally --

WATT: Yes.

DULIEN: -- you know? And then again, too, I'm just still, I just watched my mom die 48 hours before, and it's just been a really rough year and a half, and then this stuff's happening to me.

I was basically like, I don't give a f**k who this is. I'm going to do everything I can to make them pay.

Right there, you see that camera. I had the surveillance, and I basically became a detective of my own.

WATT (voice-over): And took it to social media. Friends warned Logan to be careful, said he didn't know who he was messing with.

DULIEN: If anyone can help identify him or just share this so we can try to catch the thief, I'd be greatly appreciated.

WATT (voice-over): Police now say that's Daniel Castillo, and he's facing over 30 charges, including grand theft and fraud. Stab, a surf publication, also posted an article.

DULIEN: It was all these surfers started DMing to me. The same thing happened to me. I'm like, this is what these guys do. They rob surfers.

WATT (voice-over): The crew that got Logan allegedly operated up and down the SoCal coast for years, stole from well over 100 surfers, including pro Tyler Gunter.

TYLER GUNTER, PROFESSIONAL SURFER: Went out for a quick, maybe 40- minute surf. Came back, and I'm looking through my attire. I'm like, man, where's my keys? Like, I swear my keys should be here, because now I'm stuck in a parking lot in my wetsuit with no resources, no phone, nothing. And they're off doing whatever they were doing.

WATT (voice-over): Spending lots of his money at a mall, and liquidating his stock and crypto portfolios, according to Gunter.

GUNTER: I can't call the banks and stop what's happening.

WATT: Because?

GUNTER: Because I have no phone.

WATT: How much did you lose?

GUNTER: I think all in all, a little over 50 grand.

WATT (voice-over): That accomplice who talked told agents they focused on vehicles belonging to surfers, as the surfers would be out on the water for significant periods of time and would not be able to take their keys with them.

Logan is a well-known surf film director. He'd been working nonstop on the latest installment of his series, "Snapt5," and he'd racked up debt financing the film.

DULIEN: I had $30,000 in debt to American Express. They paid off the American Express through my online banking, so they could go shop. A detective from American Express reached out to me. That day that they got me, they got three other surfers from Huntington, and the total, he said that day, between four surfers was a quarter million dollars.

WATT: What?

DULIEN: I don't know yet, and I'm about to find out that, yes, there's these other lower-end guys, but it's really, it's one guy. It's a professional Jedi master hacker.

WATT (voice-over): According to court documents, Castillo immediately gave Logan's phone and wallet to that hacker, Moundir Kamil. Bypassing phone security and face ID is very complex. Even the FBI has to bring in outside contractors to do it. Once in, the thieves have access to pretty much everything you have.

DULIEN: Sometimes people get their cars broken into, that's standard, right? But it's the hack.

WATT (voice-over): Thieves kept hitting this exact same street but never leaving quite enough evidence for arrests until a neighbor of Logan's sets up cameras.

DULIEN: They got the guys, like, red-handed. It has them visually going in, it has them handing off the phone. I mean, it has everything. And the big kahuna was there a block or two away.

WATT (voice-over): Moundir Kamil, a Moroccan national in this country illegally, previously convicted of bank robbery and fraud, he served jail time here in California.

DULIEN: I don't care if you're a Republican, if you're a Democrat, how could anyone think, yes, let's keep this guy, let's -- let him hang here and keep robbing all of us.

[08:00:00]

WATT (voice-over): Kamil is now in custody awaiting trial for these alleged crimes. An attorney for Kamil declined to comment.

DULIEN: The surf community is one, like, tribe. Everyone doesn't get along, but, like, at the end of the day, if someone's drowning, we're going to do whatever we can to save them, and they would vice versa. I feel very happy to know that these guys aren't going to do this to anyone else, especially other surfers.