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White House, Kremlin Give Mixed Signals on Putin-Zelenskyy Meeting; Hurricane Erin Thrashes the East Coast, Life-threatening Rip Currents, Monster Wave and Dangerous Surf; Texas House Reconvenes, Moves Closer to Passing Redistricting Bill; Judge Rejects DOJ Request to Unseal Epstein Grand Jury Docs. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired August 20, 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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[14:00:38]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Two summits forward, one step back. New statements from Moscow are leading to serious questions about just how much progress was made during President Trump's back-to-back summits with Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": And do you want fries with that? Vice President J.D. Vance going to a D.C. Shake Shack one day after President Trump said his crime crackdown was making D.C. safe to dine out again in. He argues it's led to a boom at the city's restaurants, some reports indicate otherwise. Plus, a new forecast for Hurricane Erin as it inches closer to the East Coast. A warning now that conditions are expected to deteriorate in South -- in North Carolina. We're following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to "CNN News Central."

Today, the Kremlin appears to be openly contradicting the White House, again downplaying the prospect of a meeting between Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine. The White House has insisted that plans for a bilateral meeting are underway, but Russia's top diplomat, Sergey Lavrov is again indicating that Kremlin has not agreed to the meeting. Instead, he says that Putin supports sending more high-level officials to talks with Ukraine. Lavrov also pouring some cold water on future security guarantees for Ukraine, saying any discussion about Ukraine's security without Russian involvement is a "path to nowhere."

Let's go to CNN's Kristin Holmes, who's live force at the White House. Kristen, there is a lot of daylight here between Washington and Moscow. What are you understanding?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, and clearly this is moving in a direction that the White House does not want it to. They were hoping to be able to talk about a potential bilat and details around that as soon as by the end of the week or at least next week. So far, other than the idea of just floating locations they could possibly be held, Hungary, Switzerland, Geneva, other than that, it appears that nothing else has been set. I was told there is no date, no time, and no location on the books. So it gives you some idea of where these negotiations are. And just to be clear, I mean this idea of having high-level Russian officials meet with Ukrainians, that's already happened. That was the reason President Trump and these European leaders put forward the idea of a direct meeting between Zelenskyy and Putin. Now on those security guarantees, now you're hearing from Lavrov, basically pulling back on anything that we heard or we understood that President Trump and Putin had spoke about in their summit on Friday.

I just want to get -- play for you a little bit of what the White House is saying both about those security guarantees and about that meeting and how it differs from what we just said Lavrov is saying.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEVE WITKOFF, UNITED STATES SPECIAL ENVOY: So, Putin has said that a red flag is NATO admission. And so, what we were discussing was assuming that that held, we sort of were able to bypass that and get an agreement that the United States could offer Article V protection, which was the first time we had ever heard the Russians agree to that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did Putin promise to do a meeting with Zelenskyy, a direct meeting in the coming weeks?

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: He has. And I just answered that question for you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: And to be clear, we haven't had an answer to that question yet on Putin. And it certainly seems like from the Kremlin, that they aren't saying that he has fully agreed to this. Now the big question is how long is President Trump willing to let this last and linger out there before intervening? Because of course, it has the potential to be embarrassing. One of the things that we know is that President Trump originally wanted this trilateral meeting, and then they shifted with the European Unions to this idea of a bilateral meeting. But if no meeting is happening at all, that would mean that these talks are stalled and that's not a position that this White House wants to be in.

KEILAR: No, certainly not. Kristen Holmes, thank you for the report from the White House. Boris?

SANCHEZ: Let's get some analysis from Josh Rogin. He's a Lead Global Security Analyst for the Washington Post Intelligence. Josh, great to have you as always. So you heard the Press Secretary there confirming that Putin had agreed to a meeting. The Kremlin publicly has not said that. Trump himself yesterday said that he sort of set up a meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy.

[14:05:00]

If it happens, that would mark just a stunning reversal for Putin, right? Agreeing to sit down with someone that he sees as an illegitimate leader of a country that he doesn't believe should exist. So, how likely is that reversal? How likely is this meeting to actually happen?

JOSH ROGIN, LEAD GLOBAL SECURITY ANALYST, WASHINGTON POST INTELLIGENCE: Well, Boris, I think we'd have to say that the chances are somewhere between slim and none. I mean, as you mentioned, Vladimir Putin wants to solve the war by getting rid of Zelenskyy. So that makes it really tough for him to solve the war by negotiating with Zelenskyy. He's not going to do it. And I think everybody knows he is not going to do it. The European leaders know he is not going to do it. Zelenskyy knows he is not going to do it. But they want to seem open to it, so Trump doesn't think that they're to blame for it not happening, and they're all just trying to convince Trump that they're not to blame and that Putin's to blame for it not happening.

But President Trump is pretty solid in his belief that Putin is basically on the right side of this and Zelenskyy is on the wrong side of this. So, that's the crazy situation that we're in. President Trump is running around trying to set up a meeting that is very unlikely to ever happen, but he's just not convinced of that until he sees it fail. So we all have to go through this kabuki diplomacy until it all fails.

SANCHEZ: That's an interesting way to put it. So in your view, these European leaders that came to the White House, including President Zelenskyy, they're just sort of playacting so that Trump can't blame them when inevitably, apparently this meeting doesn't happen, or at least it doesn't actually lead to substantial peace?

ROGIN: Exactly. I mean, we're all sort of put in this position where -- wouldn't everybody like for President Trump to succeed in his goal of making peace? At the same time, it's pretty obvious that Trump's perception of Putin's position, his perception of Putin's willingness to make peace totally wrong, and all you have to do is listen to Putin or Sergey Lavrov. They're saying it all the time, nothing that they are saying -- or by the way, they're also continuing to kill Ukrainians every day.

SANCHEZ: Right.

ROGIN: So it's kind of like, this crazy situation where we all have to pretend that Trump is right until he figures out that he is wrong. And then we can go back to the war probably where it left off, unfortunately.

SANCHEZ: You mentioned Sergey Lavrov, the Russian Foreign Minister. He says that the Kremlin is prepared to send more senior officials that may have thus far to meet with Ukrainian counterparts. That doesn't signal any kind of real progress to you?

ROGIN: No, I mean, like, your -- the previous reporter said, this has happened before, and the Russians are happy to engage in useless diplomatic meetings in order to tap along the Ukrainians and the Americans to stave off pressure. That's what they're trying to do. They're trying to pretend to be interested in peace, so Trump won't sanction them more. And it's working because Trump keeps delaying all of the pressure. But of course, the reverse side of that is that without any pressure, they won't actually negotiate in earnest. So, President Trump is actually undermining his own strategy by refusing to bring pressure on the Russians, and the Russians are abusing that by taking concessions from Trump and Zelenskyy and pocketing them and then continuing the killing. And that's the cycle we've been in ever since President Trump became president. All it does is really weaken the Ukrainian's position and get more Ukrainians killed and really sacrifice a chance for peace rather than taking advantage of one. SANCHEZ: So, I spoke with, the top Democrat on the House Armed

Services Committee yesterday, Adam Smith. He told us that he wants the U.S. and Europe to arm Ukraine so much that it forces Putin to stop thinking that he can win and make good on his goal of taking all of Ukraine. Is the only solution at this point more force or the threat of it, or what other avenues does President Trump have to potentially corner Putin into stopping this onslaught?

ROGIN: Right. Well, many will criticize the Biden administration for not fully sanctioning Russia and fully arming Ukraine, and I think there's some merit to that criticism. But what we're finding with the Trump administration is that getting rid of the pressure and just pressuring Ukraine also doesn't work. So, the only thing really left is to increase the pressure on Russia and increase the support for Ukraine. And that may not bring Putin to the table, but even if it doesn't, it has a really good effect which is to save Ukrainian lives every day.

And the more support we give to Ukraine, the more pressure we put on Russia, more Ukrainians will live. And that's a win in and of itself. And the problem with psychopathic mass murdering dictators like Putin is that they're really tough to negotiate with and sometimes they just don't want to stop the fighting. And that's the situation we're in. So I think the best we could do is, keep their power as low as possible, increase the Ukrainian's power as much as possible, and wait until Putin either dies or gets exhausted or gets thrown out of office.

[14:10:00]

And one of those three things is probably going to be how this thing ends, but unfortunately not anytime soon.

SANCHEZ: All right. Josh Rogin, thanks so much for joining us. Appreciate the time.

ROGIN: Anytime.

SANCHEZ: Brianna?

KEILAR: We're also monitoring breaking news on the East coast and moments ago, we received this new update on Hurricane Erin from the National Hurricane Center. Right now, monster waves, some are more than 20-feet high, and they are pounding North Carolina's beaches. The storm is triggering a state of emergency and evacuation orders as it's moving north. Local officials up and down North Carolina's Outer Banks are warning residents to evacuate now, while they still can with widespread flooding expected. We have Meteorologist Derek Van Dam, who is tracking the latest here. Derek, give us the latest, what you're seeing.

DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Brianna, just look at how much more organized Hurricane Erin is compared to what it was 24 hours ago. What a marked difference. You can even see the center of the storm, the eye is starting to clear out. We are so lucky, I can't overstate this enough, that this is not going to make a direct landfall, but of course, there is some serious impacts coming that we'll talk about.

Just to give you the perspective and idea of what's happening to this wind field. At 11:00 a.m., it was 90 miles out from the center for hurricane-force winds. It has now expanded to 105 miles from the center, much of that over the eastern quadrant of the hurricane. But that just gives you an idea just as we forecast this expanding wind field that will scrape the Outer Banks into tonight and into early tomorrow morning.

Currently a Category 2, let's time this out for you in terms of the winds. You could see Hatteras, the outer banks, we're getting into those tropical storm conditions late tonight into early tomorrow morning, then into Virginia and as far north as the Delmarva Peninsula, potentially into the coastline of New Jersey as well. Tropical storm force winds potentially felt by Thursday afternoon near the Nantucket region, as this makes its closest approach. You can see the official forecast track now has a major hurricane in the cards. So, we are seeing this re-strengthening of Hurricane Erin because of the warm waters and the more favorable environmental conditions.

So it's agitating the Western Atlantic. We know it's pushing up the waves, 50 to 20 foot breakers, that is not something you want to mess around with into the OBX. This 2,000-mile coastline stretch here along the eastern seaboard is really at risk with all of the rip currents that we're anticipating. Even if it's a nice day across northern New England, the Atlantic seaboard, do not head out to the beaches and get in the water. If you're an experienced swimmer, it is not advised. Stay out. That's your best advice that I can give you.

This storm surge is going to provide an issue as well. Highway 12 that accesses much of the outer banks, likely will continue to see that over wash as many of the buildings and structures here as we've seen are already taking on water, and that's even at low tide. Now, we're working into a high tide cycle. This will be the highest tides of the month. You're combining that with an onshore wind. You're combining that with the storm surge potential as Erin pushes up the ocean. And of course, that is a recipe for concern with the inundation that we're anticipating in the normally dry areas of that -- of the outer banks.

KEILAR: Yeah.

VAN DAM: Brianna?

KEILAR: Come on, OBX surfers, now is not the time even though I know they're tempted. And Derek Van Dam --

VAN DAM: Exactly.

KEILAR: Thank you so much for that. Still to come, heart wrenching testimony in Texas as the mother of the only girl still missing from Camp Mystic urges lawmakers to pass a series of flood related bills after the legislation stalled amid the redistricting fight.

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[14:18:13]

SANCHEZ: We're keeping a close eye on the Texas State House in Austin right now, where Republicans are closing in on a vote to pass their controversial new congressional map that's designed to give their party five additional House seats in Washington. Democrats for just over three hours now have been delaying the proceedings. But Republican House Speaker -- the Republican House speaker, I should say, earlier locked the chamber door, saying that no one can leave until a vote happens.

CNN's Arlette Saenz is following all of this inside the state capitol. I am confident you're not locked in, Arlette, give us an update on what's going on.

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Boris, Texas House lawmakers have been in the chamber debating this redistricting bill for around three hours now. The Democrats have been introducing amendment after amendment and also trying to make their case against these new congressional maps as they are preparing for legal challenges to the maps in the coming weeks and months. Here is one exchange that took place between a Democratic and Republican lawmaker, as Democrats have tried to argue that these maps will dis-empower black and Latino voters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. BARBARA GERVIN-HAWKINS, (D) TEXAS STATE HOUSE: Representative Hunter, I do respect you tremendously and I respect this body, but what I don't respect is an obvious racist move on what we try -- what you're attempting to do. But --

REP. TODD HUNTER, (R) TEXAS STATE HOUSE: We disagree a hundred percent.

GERVIN-HAWKINS: When you lose two African-American leaning seats, then that tells you there is a race issue going on.

HUNTER And Rucho, it gave the exact same argument about --

GERVIN-HAWKINS: Rucho, Bucho, Hucho.

HUNTER: What -- I wouldn't make fun of --

(CROSSTALK)

GERVIN-HAWKINS: Eliminate two African-American seats.

HUNTER: -- the U.S. Supreme Court, representative. I don't think that's right.

[14:20:00]

Let's not demean the process.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: Now, once these debates and amendments are completed, there will be a first vote to advance the measure. And then there will still need to be a final passage vote. It's potentially -- there's a possibility that could happen today, but that timing really remains in flux. The bill would then have to head over to the Senate.

SANCHEZ: Arlette, part of the reason that this special session was called was to address issues caused by the flooding that we saw in Central Texas earlier this summer. And actually today, the parents of flood victims have been speaking out as they testify before the Texas Senate. What have we heard from them?

SAENZ: Yeah, flood relief is also one of the agenda items on this -- in this second special session. And we heard just moments ago from this mother, CeCe Williams Steward, whose eight-year-old daughter is still missing from the floods in Texas. Here's a bit of that moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CECE WILLIAMS STEWARD, MOTHER OF ONLY CAMPER STILL MISSING AFTER JULY 4 FLOODS: Obvious common sense safety measures were absent. Protocols that should have been in place were ignored. As a result, my daughter was stolen from us. Cile's life ended not because of an unavoidable act of nature, but because of preventable failures. She was stolen from her family, from her future, from the world she lit up.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: So very emotional testimony there. Texas House Democrats have criticized Republicans for not bringing up flood relief first, but instead going with the Redistricting Bill as the first measure they would consider in the second special session. Republicans have argued that Democrats stood in the way of this flood relief by leaving the state in the first place during that first special session. So, a lot of political blame game going on at this moment. But clearly, this is something that's very important to those families who lost their loved ones in those Hill Country Texas floods.

SANCHEZ: Yeah, no doubt. Arlette Saenz, thank you so much for the reporting from Austin. Brianna?

KEILAR: And breaking news in the Jeffrey Epstein controversy, a federal judge has just rejected the Trump Administration's request to make grand jury documents in the case public. The judge had this to say in his ruling, "The information contained in the Epstein grand jury transcripts pales in comparison to the Epstein investigation information and materials in the hand of the Department of Justice." We have CNN Legal Analyst Elliot Williams with us now. Quite a response from the judge there, Elliot.

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: It is quite a response and he even uses -- the language I thought you were going to quote Brianna is where he says that the Justice Department has a substantial investigative trove in their possession that could be released to the public if the Justice Department so chose. There's nothing shocking about the judge denying a request to unsealed grand jury materials because of how clear the law really is around the country about not making grand jury materials public. So this isn't a big shock here, certainly not the last we've heard of this.

KEILAR: And it's another judge, right, doing this. So another federal judge has already denied a DOJ request to release Ghislaine Maxwell's grand jury transcripts. And they said that much of what the DOJ sought is already public, it was presented during her trial. So it's out there. DOJ knows what's in the transcripts. So when you're hearing what these two judges are saying here, Elliot, what should we actually be concluding about whether the DOJ is actually working in good faith to be transparent about what's in the docs?

WILLIAMS: Yeah, I think the good faith question is a very important one. To be clear, it would've been incredibly unlikely for grand jury materials to ever have been released in this case. As I'd said a moment ago, the law is remarkably clear on this issue and it's really only subject to very few exceptions when you would ever make grand jury materials public. So then the next question is, well, what could be made public? It's whatever is in the Justice Department's possession and that's all of their investigative files that the judge today made a reference to.

Now, it's a judgment call for the Justice Department to decide how much of its files it would wish to make public in this case. But it really comes to them. And to your question about good faith, it's really a question for where the Justice Department wishes to satisfy public clamoring for information on this, but also the desire to protect the things that are in their possession. And that's really a call only the Attorney General and the people around her can make.

KEILAR: Elliot, the judge denying the Epstein grand jury transcript said that another compelling reason to keep the records sealed are possible threats to victim safety and privacy.

[14:25:00]

We have to remember that there are victims at the heart of this who were children when this happened. Right? And so, I want to ask you about something that we are hearing amid this political brawling that's going on here in Washington over this. I was speaking last night with a member of the House Oversight Committee, a Democrat, Jasmine Crockett, who says that the entire committee should get completely unredacted files from DOJ, which would include victims' names. It would include child sexual abuse material. I asked her about that and I challenged her because, as you were well aware, Congress isn't exactly known for discretion when it comes to there being political points available to be scored.

But she said they can handle this responsibility and if anyone did do anything wrong with it, they should basically be punished. But she doesn't trust the DOJ to be the arbiters of what gets through to them. What do -- what do you think about that? How do you balance these things?

WILLIAMS: Yeah, it's a tough balance. And look, I've worked in both places and to be clear, Congress regularly says that they can protect materials. They say we have security clearances and we can keep a secret. We're a co-equal branch of government. They also, Brianna, have enormous political considerations. And so for instance, yes, they will have the names of victims that they could keep private, but they also have an interest in calling them to testify or bringing them out in public. And how could they ensure the Justice Department that they would not do that?

I really am with the Justice Department on this. It is in very rare circumstances that materials are released to Congress and it's only under strict assurances from them that I don't know if such a polarized Congress, no matter who's in charge, really is capable of doing on this issue.

KEILAR: Really interesting. Elliot Williams, thank you so much.

WILLIAMS: Thanks, Brianna.

KEILAR: Next, selling President Trump's D.C. crackdown, Vice President J.D. Vance out and about in the Capitol today, touting the federal takeover of D.C. Police and casting doubt on D.C.'s official crime statistics. We'll have that next.

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