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Trump & Musk Turn on Each Other in Escalating Public Feud; Republicans Caught in the Middle of Trump-Musk Feud; Sources Say Trump Plans Major Cuts to California's Federal Funding; Judge Rules Against Trump Over International Student Visas at Harvard; D.C. Prepares to Host Largest Military Parade in Decades. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired June 06, 2025 - 14:00   ET

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

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[14:00:56]

DANNY FREEMAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": President Trump says he's not even thinking about Elon Musk, but today, he did have something to say about him after their explosive feud. We'll have the latest on that billionaire breakup.

JESSICA DEAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": In the meantime, Musk isn't the only one tussling with the White House. A judge blocks Trump's decision to suspend Harvard visa applications, but that isn't stopping the State Department from telling embassies to refuse applications from Harvard international students. And in the Sean "Diddy" Combs trial, another woman is testifying under a pseudonym, telling the jury graphic details about what she calls hotel nights. We are following these major developing stories and many more, they're all coming in right here to "CNN News Central."

FREEMAN: Happening now. It is the day after President Donald Trump and Elon Musk's implosion. The dust so far seems to be settling more today than stirring up, at least publicly. But, if the last 24 hours taught us anything, it's that everything can change at the drop of just one social media post. Next hour, we could see President Trump as he leaves the White House. Earlier, he told CNN, he's "not even thinking about Elon." But, nearly all of Washington is, wondering where this feud could go next.

For more on this, we have CNN's Kristen Holmes. She's live at the White House. Kristen, what are you learning this hour about this fight?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, Danny, I would say it's not just Washington, it's really all over the globe. I've talked to Trump advisors who are not even in the country, who have been following this incredibly closely, people who have something to lose with both of these parties and are invested in both of these parties. Obviously, we have not seen a public breakup like this almost ever, particularly given how Musk was so influential in the first half of Donald Trump's tenure so far.

So, what I'm hearing from the White House is they want to move on. They have been driving this point home. They want to move on. They don't want to talk about Elon Musk. They don't want to talk about any of this feud. They were given a directive by the president himself, focus on the bill. Just a reminder, this all started with Elon Musk hitting over this legacy bill of Donald Trump's that's currently in the Senate. They want to get this passed. Donald Trump believes it is one of the most important things that he's going to do in his time in office.

Now, Donald Trump told Dana Bash when they talked this morning this about Elon Musk. He said, he's got a problem. The poor guy has got a problem. So yes, they want to move on, but it's not stopping him from lashing out a little bit here, as you see, saying that Elon Musk has a problem. But it's not just the White House who's involved, a lot of the MAGA-sphere is involved here. We saw Steve Bannon really taking on Elon Musk, saying the president should institute an executive order where he could take over SpaceX.

We saw Musk responding to this saying, Bannon advocates crime because he is a criminal. There is a whole back and forth going on, all of it or most of it going on, on social media. But I can tell you that, right now, there are no plans for Trump to talk to Musk, no plans for the two of them to reconnect. And even allies who have been hoping for this have started to see this as a lost cause. As you say, we'll see Donald Trump later today when he leaves for New Jersey. And of course, we'll try to ask him about this. We'll see if he really does want to move on then.

FREEMAN: All right, quieter today. But yeah, story far from over. Kristen Holmes, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Jessica?

DEAN: Republicans on Capitol Hill are not at all that eager to choose sides in this feud between Trump and Musk over that bill that's trying to make its way through Capitol Hill right now. CNN's Lauren Fox is on the Hill. She joins us now. Lauren, I know you did speak with Speaker Johnson earlier today. He's kind of found himself in the middle of this a little bit as well. What did he have to say to you?

LAUREN FOX, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, I mean, just a couple of days ago, Speaker Johnson was saying he was going to try to get Elon Musk on the phone, try to iron things out. When I asked him this morning, if he had yet had that phone conversation, he said that they had communicated a bit via text. But at this point, he says he just hopes that the president and Elon Musk can reconcile. Here he was.

[14:05:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MIKE JOHNSON, (R-LA) HOUSE SPEAKER: I'm not going to speak for either of them. I was with the president in the Oval Office yesterday afternoon as some of this unfolded. And I got to say he was disappointed. I mean, he said that himself and I was as well. But, look, I believe in redemption. I hope we can resolve it and get everybody together again. That's really important for all of us.

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FOX: And the reason that that may be so important to Speaker Johnson, Jessica, is the fact that he has a number of conservatives in his conference who may be experiencing a little bit of buyer's remorse over this Big Beautiful Bill that was passed out of the House just a little over a week ago now. Right now, I was speaking just a couple of hours ago with some of those House conservatives, including Chip Roy and Thomas Massie. Thomas Massie voted against this bill, and he said that at the end of the day, the math is going to win out here. And while he doesn't want to get involved in a tussle between the president and Elon Musk, he said Musk certainly is making the exact same points he's been making and other conservatives have been making, that this bill did not go far enough in curbing the country's debt and deficit. Jessica?

DEAN: All right. Lauren Fox on Capitol Hill, thank you so much. And joining us now to talk more about this, CNN Chief Media Analyst, Brian Stelter and Washington Bureau Chief for The Boston Globe, Jackie Kucinich. Great to have both of you here with us.

Jackie, look, it's not necessarily a surprise that we're seeing this breakdown, this very public, very intense breakup between Trump and Musk. And yesterday, there was so much drama to all of it, everybody watching that unfold. But there are real potential implications here politically and also what it means for Trump's agenda, how it moves forward, who's going to shape Trump's thinking around how to run the government. What are you hearing about that as the conversation kind of shifts to that piece of it?

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST AND WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, THE BOSTON GLOBE: What you have is, aside from some of those conservatives who Lauren just mentioned, who are experiencing buyer's remorse, you don't hear a lot of Republicans on the Hill siding with Musk who weren't already predisposed to not liking the Big Beautiful Bill. So, I don't know that at the end of the day, that this is not going to pass as a result of anything Musk is doing, but he is adding fuel to the fire. But looking broader, stepping back from the Big Beautiful Bill debate, Musk isn't that easy to extract from the U.S. government.

You look at things, SpaceX's involvement with NASA and the Pentagon, just as one example. So when Trump was talking about canceling those contracts, you saw that Trump -- that Elon Musk came back and mentioned some of the SpaceX projects that he has going. So, this is much bigger than even this. But then, tax credits for EVs, this is a -- there's a lot of levers in the government that are involved with Elon Musk.

FREEMAN: Brian, there were a lot of posts yesterday, lot to sift through and choose from. But I did want to highlight one of them because this stood out, I think, to a lot of folks. This tweet right here. Oh, and some food for thought, as they ponder this question, Trump has three-and-a-half years left as president, but I will be around for 40 plus years. Listen, aside from I guess the own prediction of how long Elon Musk will be around or live, what's your take? Is Musk really willing to walk away from this White House after being attached in the hip for so long?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST: He is ready. He is willing. And for the record, he is 53 years old. So yes, he does believe he is going to live for a long, long time. And his number one priority, let's not forget, is Mars. It's not Washington, D.C., right? It is Mars. It is making earth an interplanetary species. You don't get to be where Elon Musk is without having a healthy ego or probably an unhealthy ego. He wants attention, he wants customers, he wants re- tweeters and admirers. Maybe he wants more girlfriends to have more kids with.

So right now, he's been sharing the MAGA movement fan base with Trump, right? It's been this alliance for about a year. He endorsed Trump on the day of the Butler assassination attempt. So for about a year, they've been sharing the fan club. But Musk also has his own fan club, and he is very much willing to go over and focus and gravitate over there. And I think that's partly what his third-party threats are about. He can't run to be president because he wasn't born in the United States, but he can certainly help someone else do it. He can create his own fan clubs, and I think that's what he's focusing on now.

DEAN: And Brian, I think that, is the concern for some Republicans is if he's promised to spend big in the midterms, and maybe he doesn't do that, that could have broader implications.

STELTER: Right.

DEAN: I also want to get your take though on the fact that Musk does own X and we are all, I think, pretty clear-eyed that X and social media are not the real world. However, they can be incredible platforms. And Musk is also, a real -- has been held up before this time as a real hero to a certain segment of the population. I think a lot -- I'm thinking a lot of those kind of male voters that maybe voted for the first time. What -- how does that figure into this kind of power struggle?

STELTER: Yeah. I think one of the big questions now is, is he going to change the X algorithm?

[14:10:00]

A lot of folks last fall perceived that the social media platform firmly known as Twitter, became a lot more pro-Trump. And it wasn't just because Trump fans were joining and liberals were leaving for Bluesky. There was also this suspicion that behind the scenes, Musk was prioritizing pro-Trump content. He could very easily de-prioritize MAGA content. He could very easily put his thumb on the digital scale and push anti-Trump messages.

That's a big question mark going forward. There's a lot of ethical implications there about who controls technology and whether he should have so much power. I get that. But that's a big question going forward, given how popular X is. And frankly, I think folks like President Trump would rather for us (ph) talk about the personality conflicts, whether Musk is crazy. Like, they'd rather have the focus on that than on the substance of the bill.

So, Musk can use his megaphone to focus on the bill, to focus on the cuts to Medicaid, or the focus to the cuts to food stamps. I think what we're going to see from Musk is an attempt to focus on the deficit and the spending questions, while it seems Trump would like to, well, smear Musk a little bit and suggest he's crazy or he has something wrong with him.

FREEMAN: Well, Jackie, I mean, to Brian's point, I mean, I think we could say at this point, after 24 hours, that the White House really has been trying to stay focused as much as they can on the bill, and not -- even though Musk would say that Trump started, I guess, from the Oval Office yesterday. They've tried to keep laser focus since then on this bill. Do you think, Jackie, that the White House and Trump can stay focused on this bill, I guess, as long as Musk stops posting on X?

KUCINICH: I think as long as this continues, I mean, yes, you're going to have a segment of the White House focused on the bill, but I mean, this is a White House that focuses on a lot of things at one time.

(LAUGH)

KUCINICH: Let's not forget when this started, they implemented a new travel ban. So, it's not like this isn't the -- this is the only -- the bill is the only thing that they're focused on. But listen, I think there is a segment in the White House that really does want to reconcile with Musk because they can see that what -- a danger he could be to the president's political fortunes, both with this bill, but also even if he -- I mean, he said he doesn't want to get in touch -- get involved in midterms, but he has also said that politicians who betray the American people will be punished or something like that. I'm paraphrasing.

So, that specter of him getting involved, even if he doesn't unseat Republicans, that will force him to spend a lot of money potentially to defend seats, which could be problematic going into what promises to be a very competitive midterm election.

DEAN: Yeah. And Brian, Musk came onto the scene backing Trump and that was interesting to kind of watch unfold. But, what was interesting too was previous to that, it wasn't like he was a really huge MAGA guy or he has had kind of -- he has supported and voiced support for different priorities, but he's always been keen on cutting federal spending. I mean, obviously, we have DOGE, but that was always something he just believes he could come in and move fast and break things, and it turned out the government wasn't that way. Where does that come from and what happens now to DOGE and to that kind of thinking within this administration?

STELTER: Well, I think that's a big question. I think a lot of voters, a lot of voters want to know what happens to DOGE. A lot of voters were really invested in this concept of going to the agencies and getting rid of waste and fraud. Now, we've heard from some of these DOGE staffers, they didn't find as many inefficiencies as they expected. But I do think that DOGE question is an outstanding question that's going to linger for quite some time. Musk is like a lot of folks, he's socially liberal in some ways and fiscally conservative, and he has had this concern about high deficits for quite a while.

But he has also found -- he's shown an ability to really change and evolve politically quite quickly. So, we can't count anything out in terms of how he might evolve next. I would think it's worth noting, by the way, Tesla stock back up 5 percent today. Right? Huge decline yesterday. It's going to take a while to recover. But some investors came back today, some had a vote of confidence in Musk by buying up shares today. We have no idea where Musk and Tesla are going to be a week or a month or a year from now, nevermind the midterms 18 months from now.

DEAN: Yeah. Well, we shall see. It seems like dog years away at this point, even though it'll be here very quickly. Brian Stelter and Jackie Kucinich, thank you so much.

(LAUGH)

DEAN: We really appreciate both of you. Some major developments out of the White House where sources CNN, President Trump is planning large-scale cuts to California's federal funding. I want to go now to CNN's Annie Grayer, who's on Capitol Hill, watching this development for us. Annie, we're told some of these cuts could begin as soon as today. What are you learning?

ANNIE GRAYER, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Well, Jessica, we're told that agencies have already started preparing what cuts they can make. And this has also made its way to Capitol Hill where a whistleblower informed a committee that they're expecting cuts to all of the federal research grants in California.

[14:15:00]

Now, we've also recently heard back from the administration who said that no final decision has been made here, but there are also consideration for cuts specifically to the UC, California school system. So, there are a lot of questions swirling about the size and scope of the cuts here, but there is a lot of concern because this would be a pretty rare move to single out just California here.

DEAN: And yeah. What -- is there any -- what's the motivation here? What's going on?

GRAYER: Well, there are a lot of politics swirling around this, and of course, there is no love lost between President Trump and Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom. I mean, just recently, Trump threatened to pull all federal funding from California after an incident with a transgender athlete in a sporting event. And beyond that, California has been targeted over cutting water construction projects recently, as I reported, over $100 million funding cut there.

And Trump has been very critical of California's response to the devastating wildfires that we saw. And just the long bitter history between Trump and Newsom here really can't be understated. So, everyone is watching to see exactly what the administration does, but we are hearing from sources across the government that this is being prepared and potentially underway.

DEAN: Yeah. The dynamics between those two men, there's so much and there's probably still so much more to come. Annie Grayer from Capitol Hill, thank you so much.

Still to come here on "CNN News Central," brand new details about President Trump's military parade. We're going to take a closer look at the price tag of this mega event and the new warnings about A.I. going rogue. That and much more, coming up on "CNN News Central."

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[14:20:23]

DEAN: A new setback for the Trump administration as it takes on Harvard University. A federal judge issuing a temporary restraining order blocking President Trump's attempt to suspend international student visas for the school. CNN's Katelyn Polantz has been following this case. Katelyn, good to have you here. So, what did the judge say?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, the judge, she stepped in last night. There was this presidential proclamation on Wednesday. There was another move by the Trump administration to try and block international students from coming to Harvard. The judge stepped in very fast after Harvard asked for emergency help yesterday and said the school would sustain immediate and irreparable injury before there is an opportunity to hear from all parties if she didn't put a block on this presidential proclamation.

But stepping back, what Harvard has said all along in this case, this case is not new as of this week. They've said that they believe the Trump administration may want to engage in some sort of shenanigans, something to potentially hurt Harvard's ability to bring in international students. The case kicked up initially before because there was action by the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of State. The judge stepped in there and then, we saw this turn as this is playing out in court, of this becoming something that ratcheted up with a presidential proclamation. Now, the judge stepping in again.

What she's blocking here is the proclamation that was suspending what the administration says was a class of aliens detrimental to the United States who may have been going to Harvard. They said that there was a national security risk there. There's going to be a lot of litigation over this, but it's a big fight now between Harvard who says their international student population is central to who they are as a campus, as a place that conducts scientific research, that it's a quarter of their population and the Trump administration which doesn't want international students there.

DEAN: Yeah, and more to come on this for sure. Katelyn Polantz, thank you so much. Danny?

FREEMAN: The nation's capital is preparing for a massive military parade next weekend. And today, we're getting new details about the cost surrounding the event. President Trump ordered the largest military parade in decades to celebrate the Army's 250th Anniversary, which also coincides with the president's birthday. CNN's Natasha Bertrand is live at the Pentagon. Natasha, tell us what more are you learning?

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Danny, this is going to be a massive event. It's going to be the biggest military parade that Washington, D.C. has seen in decades. And it's going to feature tanks, including very heavy Abrams Tanks, Bradley and Stryker Fighting Vehicles, which are very heavy tracked vehicles. And those are going to be rolling down the streets of Washington. D.C.

Now all told, this parade is expected to cost roughly $45 million, but the Army has spent just about $3 million alone trying to prepare the city for this massive parade and try to protect D.C. roads and infrastructure from the weight of these vehicles that are going to be rolling down the streets. Now, as part of those mitigation efforts, we're told that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, they have been working for months with the city of D.C., with the various stakeholders here to try to protect infrastructure, and that includes putting metal plates down along various points of the roads, particularly where those tanks are going to be making sharp turns, which could impact the roads there.

They're also going to be fitting the tanks and the vehicles with new pads to create kind of a separation between the metal of those tanks and the asphalt. And importantly, these vehicles are apparently going to be going at a very slow pace, pretty much walking pace alongside the many, many soldiers that are going to be marching in this parade, as many as 7,000 soldiers are going to be participating, we're told.

[14:25:00]

Now this, as I said, has been in the works for several months. But originally, it was just going to be a big celebration honoring the Army's 250th Birthday without a parade. The White House were told a couple months ago, went to the Army and said, Hey, why don't we add a parade? As we know, President Trump dating back to his first term, he has wanted this kind of big military parade down the streets of D.C. The first time around, it was canceled. It was not -- it didn't go through because defense officials and other officials in D.C. were saying it was going to be way too expensive. It was going to potentially impact the streets and her infrastructure.

This is going to be a little bit smaller than the kind of parade that President Trump wanted to see in his first term. It's just going to be involving the Army. However, there is going to be a part of it that does involve President Trump, and that is at the end of it, when the Golden Knights, the Army's Parachute Team, is going to parachute down and present President Trump with a flag towards the end of that parade, Danny.

FREEMAN: Stunning to think that this is the smaller version of a military parade that was -- and will now happen in D.C. Natasha Bertrand, thank you very much for those details. Appreciate it. All right. Still to come, as children go hungry, what is being done to solve the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. That and much more ahead.

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