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Tariffs on Cars Start April 3rd; Rep. Jason Crow (D-CO) is Interviewed about the Signal Group Chat Breach; Cuts at Health and Human Services; Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) is Interviewed about the Testimony about the Midair Crash over the Potomac. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired March 27, 2025 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:00]

LT. COL. ALEXANDER VINDMAN (RET.), FORMER DIRECTOR FOR EUROPEAN AFFAIRS, NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL: Research and my experience in the space, understanding that the Russians are using these dangles, bright, shiny objects, to entice the Trump administration that thinks that they could get this win on peace talks and Trump could get his Nobel Peace Prize. But this is exactly the wrong way to go about it. The fact is that easing pressure on Russia gives him more breathing room, gives him less incentive to come to the negotiating table when the onus should be on Russia and our support should be to Ukraine to deliver some battlefield wins and make sure that Russia sees no way - military way to continue this war and come out with a win.

So, it's exactly the wrong lessons. The same things that we've done over the course of 35 years but now amplified in a more dangerous manner because we don't listen to the lessons of the past.

So, I would advise the administration to really kind of take another look at how they're approaching Russia, understand that they need peace through strength.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, we appreciate your time this morning. Thank you very much.

A lot of new information coming in. A brand-new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: A warning from one of America's strongest trading partners, Canada must maximize the pain for Americans, they say, after President Trump announces new tariffs on cars and car parts to set in next week. Car prices expected to jump, possibly by thousands of dollars, and sooner than you think.

Also breaking moments ago, a major overhaul coming to America's public health agencies. The Department of Health and Human Services will cut 10,000 employees. Details are just coming in. We'll bring it to you.

And we are also standing by for an important hearing to take place on Capitol Hill, on the deadly midair collision over the Potomac that killed 67 people.

Sara is out today. I'm Kate Bolduan, with John Berman. This is CNN NEW CENTRAL.

BERMAN: All right, developing this morning, we're getting new reaction in and some new warnings from leaders around the world after President Trump announced 25 percent tariffs on all cars shipped to the United States. Cars and car parts, apparently, which adds a whole different layer to it.

The premier of Ontario in Canada, Doug Ford, said this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PREMIER DOUG FORD, ONTARIO: About 65 billion of tariffs that we have on the table that we can launch towards the U.S. We have to run through every tariff and minimize the pain for Canadians, maximize the pain for Americans. And I feel terrible for the Americans, but it's one person, it's President Trump, that's creating this chaos.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Maximize the pain for Americans. Doug Ford also said he wants to inflict as much pain as possible at this point on Americans. One industry expert warns the price of cars in the United States will skyrocket in the coming weeks.

CNN's Vanessa Yurkevich is here now to explain how this will work and what might happen.

VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN BUSINESS AND POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, so, for the American consumer watching at home, what does this mean for all of us in terms of car prices? Well, according to the White House, if you have an American made car, so a car assembled here in the U.S., but you're using foreign parts, that will tack on an extra $5,000. So, a $40,000 car becomes a $45,000 car.

And that's important because of the 10.2 million cars that were manufactured here in the U.S. in 2024, those cars were 50 percent foreign made parts and 50 percent American parts. So, they're all getting hit with this tariff.

And just look at the car companies that are going to be impacted. It's all of them. It's everyone from General Motors, to Ford, to Hyundai. All of these companies either assemble here in the U.S. or abroad, but they all use foreign car parts, which is on the list to be tariffed.

We're also hearing from world leaders, as you just played, hearing from the, excuse me, from -

BERMAN: The premier of Ontario.

YURKEVICH: The premier of Ontario.

BERMAN: Doug - yes, Doug Ford.

YURKEVICH: But I want to toss to the prime minister of Canada, Mark Carney. Let's listen to him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRIME MINISTER MARK CARNEY, CANADA: This is a direct attack, to be clear. A direct attack.

We will defend our workers. We will defend our companies. We'll defend our country. And we will defend it together.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

YURKEVICH: We're also hearing from the prime minister of Japan, who says that all options are on the table in terms of how they will reciprocate. We're also hearing from Elon Musk, the owner of Tesla, who said that they're not getting away unscathed from this. This will have a significant impact.

Now, why is President Trump doing this? He wants to ensure that any company that is building a car here in the U.S. uses domestic car parts and assembles right here in the USA.

[09:05:00]

The problem with that, John, is that in order for companies to stand up new plants, new production, it takes years. It's not a flip of the switch. It takes years to do so.

And so, companies, right now, are looking at, how long are these tariffs are going to be in effect? The president says until the end of his term. But it will take just that long to stand up these plants. And after that, do these tariffs go away? They've made all of these investments, and then what happens? It's a big question for these car companies that are trying to figure out how to meet the president's demands, but also work with the reality that these tariffs are set to hit on April 3rd.

BERMAN: Yes, people need to know, this isn't like 1982. American cars use foreign parts. American made cars have car parts coming from other places, and they will be hit by these tariffs. It's not quite as simple as buy American, not like it used to be.

YURKEVICH: There's no such thing as an American made car anymore. Fully American made car.

BERMAN: Vanessa Yurkevich, important points. Thank you very much.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: Also this morning we are waiting to see if we hear more from President Trump today about that Signal group chat national security breach with the fallout as it just keeps growing and it is not going away. And Democrats also insisting that someone - there needs to be accountability somewhere with someone.

But there are also new questions this morning about the testimony the nation's top intelligence officials gave to Congress over the past two days. They insisted the group chat contained no classified information about the surprise attack on Houthis in Yemen. Now, those lawmakers think that they may have been lied to, some of them have said.

Democratic Congressman Jason Crow, he was on that committee, and he has posed some of those tough questions to the intelligence officials yesterday.

Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JASON CROW (D-CO): Director Gabbard, I want to direct your attention again to the text chain, where it says, "just confirmed with CENTCOM. We are a go for mission launch."

Does that indicate to you that there is about to be a military operation?

TULSI GABBARD, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Yes.

CROW: Director Gabbard, earlier in this hearing, we heard about the DOD's classification standards. I want to now turn my attention to your classification standards. You're the director of national intelligence. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence classification guide says, quote, "information providing indication or advance warning that the U.S. or its allies are preparing for an attack," end quote, is to be classified as top secret. Are you familiar with that?

GABBARD: Yes.

CROW: Director Gabbard, have the Houthis indicated an ability to shoot down American aircraft?

GABBARD: Yes.

CROW: They have, in fact, done so, haven't they?

GABBARD: Yes.

CROW: Including MQ-9 Reapers, haven't they?

GABBARD: That's correct.

CROW: And that was one of the systems used in the attack recently that's the subject of this discussion, is it - is it not?

GABBARD: Correct.

CROW: This is an SA-3 anti-aircraft system.

LT. GEN. JEFFREY KRUSE, DIRECTOR, DEFENSE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY: Correct.

CROW: Are you familiar with this next system?

KRUSE: I am.

CROW: What is it?

I'm going to have to ask you to -

CROW: It's an SA-6.

KRUSE: I'm going to guess that it -

CROW: This is also an advanced anti-aircraft system, is it not?

KRUSE: It is. It was used widely in the Balkans in the '90s, correct.

CROW: And the Houthis also have this system, don't they?

KRUSE: They certainly do.

CROW: And they've employed it against our aircraft, have they not?

KRUSE: They have attempted to, correct.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Joining us right now is the Democratic Congressman Jason Crow.

Thank you so much for coming in, Congressman. I appreciate your time.

REP. JASON CROW (D-CO): Thank you.

BOLDUAN: Do you - I mentioned that there are questions now, especially when it comes to the classified question and debate or non-debate, that some of your colleagues believe they were - have been lied to. Do you think any of those - the officials that testified before you lied under oath?

CROW: It's possible. I think we have to continue to do investigation. But, you know, I think it's really important that we not get wrapped up in classification debates, which is an important part of this.

The real focus should be about the pervasive recklessness and carelessness and impunity of this administration and the fact that they simply won't accept responsibility for a major mistake that everybody knows is a major mistake that endangered our troops. You know, that is a culture of disregard that I think continues to put people at risk. And that's my focus.

BOLDUAN: From the White House we have heard the questions and calls for investigation, called it a hoax. We heard the president say from the Oval Office calling the fallout, dismissing it as a witch hunt, a familiar refrain we know from this president. But hearing it in this context, what's your reaction to that?

CROW: Well, the president does what he always does. He always makes it about him. He thinks he's the one who's the victim here. He thinks he's the one who's being, you know, unfairly accused.

[09:10:02] Listen, the focus is not on the president. The focus should be on the fact that we sent our pilots, these are people's mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters. We sent them on an extremely risky, a very dangerous mission over a contested enemy territory where there are some of the most advanced anti-aircraft systems in the world. And the people who sent them into that mission, the very top national security officials, were talking about it and giving advance warning about it over an unsecured channel. It is reckless. It is, you know, fairly shocking. And Americans deserve accountability.

BOLDUAN: I want to play for you something from an interview yesterday on the show. I interviewed Republican Congressman Warren Davidson on the show, just as the news was breaking of the new Signal messages being released.

Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: As a former Army Ranger, would you be comfortable if a tick tock like this was released 30 minutes before a strike was about to take place?

REP. WARREN DAVIDSON (R-OH): Well, I haven't seen it. I heard what you reported. And I - I don't know how you would say you know exactly what the target is going to be or even who the target is going to be. It's like the - the - the named terrorist. Well, I think that could be a lot of people in the entire Middle East, frankly. So, I don't think that's very precision information.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: I actually thought of you as you are a former Army Ranger. And I was thinking - I actually thought of you when he was giving that answer because I wanted to get your reaction to that as a former Army Ranger. He does not think that that was - he clearly did not think it was dangerous.

CROW: Yes, well, the answer is, no. That's the answer, right? The element of surprise is actually one of the most important things in a sensitive, dangerous military operation. If the enemy knows you're coming, the risk goes up exponentially. Exponentially. So, the answer is, no. Clearly people should be able to say that.

And listen, you have the secretary of defense, who is responsible for our entire Department of Defense. If any private, if any sergeant, if any colonel, if any general had done the same thing, they instantly would have been relieved of command, there would be immediately an investigation, and their career would probably be over, right? But what the Trump administration is trying to tell us is that the people at the very top, they operate by a different standard. There doesn't need to be responsibility and accountability.

Now, I learned in the military that the cornerstone of leadership is accountability and responsibility. And that flows down through the organization. So, I am gravely concerned that the message coming from the Trump administration is the people at the top don't have any responsibility and accountability, and I'm concerned about the message that sends to our troops.

BOLDUAN: Given the way the president's responded, I want to ask you, let's - with the assumption that their - that officials will not face repercussions, that there will not be - there will not be a type of accountability that you - that many have called for. When nothing happens here in terms of accountability, should European allies or five eyes partners, maybe more specifically, change the way they interact with the United States in terms of intelligence? Do you think the U.S. intelligence can still be trusted?

CROW: Well, you point out another dynamic of this, right? The most important dynamic is the risk that our troops were put in and continue to be put in. Number two is the culture of disregard and recklessness that is being approved of by this administration and the impact on our military of that message. And, number three, our allies and partners, who we rely on to conduct joint military operations, to give us intelligence, to share important information, how could they not be sitting back right now and thinking, can we trust the Americans? What type of culture do they have? Can they - can they protect information, or is it going to end up in an "Atlantic" article? Very, very troubling stuff. And that's why accountability is so important here.

BOLDUAN: Congressman Jason Crow, thank you for your time.

John.

BERMAN: All right, we have breaking news, Kate. We just learned that Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy will announce huge layoffs at his agency. Thousands and thousands of jobs.

We're also getting new information in about the crash over the Potomac.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:18:48]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BERMAN: All right, there is breaking news. We just learned that Robert Kennedy Jr., the secretary of Health and Human Services, will announce huge layoffs today. Some 10,000 jobs across the agency. And this comes on top of some 10,000 employees who left the department voluntarily.

Let's get right to CNN's Meg Tirrell for the latest on this.

Where will these jobs come from?

MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John, they're announcing a pretty big restructuring here. What they're calling a transformation to make America healthy again. Of course, that's the slogan of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

They say that this restructuring will save taxpayers $1.8 billion a year. It's going to include the reduction of the workforce of about 10,000 jobs. And that's on top of 10,000 folks who already left through either early retirement or voluntary, sort of taking that fork in the road option, they say, that Elon Musk had talked about. So, that's going to bring their full-time employees down to about 62,000. That's about a quarter of the entire workforce across HHS.

Now, this plan that we just got from the department doesn't lay out exactly where those jobs are going to come from, but they do say they're consolidating 28 divisions of Health and Human Services into 15 divisions.

[09:20:02]

They call them redundant units. And they're also creating a new Administration for a Healthy America, or AHA. They say as part of this restructuring, they're going to focus on ending the chronic disease epidemic - that's something Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has talked about a lot - by focusing on, quote, "safe, wholesome food, clean water and the elimination of environmental toxins."

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. saying that they're not just reducing bureaucratic sprawl, we're, quote, "realigning the organization with its core mission and our new priorities in reversing the chronic disease epidemic."

So, there are a lot of details in here, John, but still not enough to really know exactly where these jobs are coming from. But they are really shifting around a lot of these divisions. Notably, they say they're strengthening the CDC, including folding in the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response. So, putting that national disaster and public health emergency response all under CDC.

But, John, we'd heard that CDC could be facing cuts of about 30 percent. It doesn't get this granular in this announcement yet. So, we'll be reporting today to find out exactly where these cuts are coming from.

BERMAN: Yes, clearly there is a lot more to learn here and the details matter.

Meg Tirrell, thank you for this first report. I'm sure we'll be hearing much more from you over the course of the morning.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: So, very soon we are going to learn more about the midair crash that happened over the Potomac. Now, Saturday marks two months since 67 people were killed in that terrifying crash between a commercial jet and a military helicopter. The NTSB has been investigating ever since. And this morning, NTSB and FAA leaders are set to face Congress. And some of the huge questions that still remain about how this possibly happened and how they can ensure it never happens again.

We're taking a live look inside the committee hearing room right there. Joining us right now is Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington. She's

the top Democrat on the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. The committee holding this important hearing today.

Congresswoman, thank you for being here.

That tragedy, it was so shocking. What is chief among your questions that you hope to be answered today?

SEN. MARIA CANTWELL (D-WA): Well, this was a very bad design. The fact that military aircraft could get into such close proximity of our commercial aviation system is just a very bad design. So, how did that design come about? But the NTSB, I'm sure will testify this morning, that there were lots of warning signs that there were too many times when these aircraft were coming too close together, literally with alarms going off in the air traffic system. So, why did this continue? Why were these early warnings, if you will, of potential catastrophe, ignored? And that's what we want answers to.

BOLDUAN: And you're - you're hitting on something that I've seen some reporting on, which is, there's reporting that over, I think it was just the course of a few years leading up to the crash, there was like 15,000 plus, I'll call them close calls or times when warning signs went off, warning alarms went off between commercial jets and helicopters. And that's just in the DCA airspace. How has someone not stepped in before now if that is the case?

CANTWELL: Well, I think we do have a lot of data at the FAA. I just don't know that anybody's paying close attention to it. But this was a loophole that, in my opinion, should never have been given. And once the loophole was given, then people should have monitored the situation. And clearly there was data that is going to be presented by the NTSB that said, this is a dangerous situation. And literally there was a warning sign that went off, according to their report, at least once a month, saying that the intersection of airspace was just too close to call. And so why was there not an FAA structure that basically said, oh, we see this data. This is an accident waiting to happen. And came in earlier to stop this.

So, we'll have lots of questions. Why, as I said, this was allowed to even exist in the first place. But why was data ignored when we saw? And what other incidents around the United States of America are we allowing for military and commercial aircraft where similar incidents may also still be occurring?

BOLDUAN: Senator, if the FAA failed in keeping the public safe, does Congress share in that failure and in that blame because of its oversight responsibilities?

CANTWELL: Well, I think we see in this case, we had an Obama-era rule that basically said, don't give an exemption to this important signaling of aircraft. This technology that allows people to know in the airspace, you know, who is around you. And the exemption that was given in the Trump administration, I think we do need to drill down on, because we've seen evidence since then that not only did the military say this will be kind of a rare situation, it was used quite frequently.

[09:25:08]

So, we have been working very hard since the Max crashes to say, yes, we need to have aggressive oversight of the FAA. We want them to have a safety management system, just like we want all carriers, manufacturers, to have a safety management system. Because we don't think enough focus has been put on the critical features of safety. What's happened instead are the loopholes.

BOLDUAN: Critical questions remain. How precise - what the precise reason was that this - this collision happened. And I'm very interested to hear what the NTSB presents today.

Senator Maria Cantwell, thank you very much.

John.

BERMAN: All right, we are standing by for the opening bell on Wall Street, trying to get a sense of what investors think of the new information about the 25 percent tariffs the president announced on cars and car parts. There's been a whiplash on Wall Street. What do they think now?

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