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Floor Drama Unfolds as House Works to Advance Defense Policy Bill; Interview with Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ): Trump Confirms U.S. Seized Oil Tanker Off Coast of Venezuela; Top Bipartisan Lawmakers Support Releasing Video of Boat Strikes; Trump Holds Business Roundtable at White House and Takes Questions. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired December 10, 2025 - 15:30   ET

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

[15:30:00]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Floor drama playing out on Capitol Hill as House leaders work to advance the huge $900 billion defense bill. There's a provision tucked inside the bill that would try to force Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to release unedited videos of those strikes on alleged drug boats.

CNN's Arlette Saenz is on Capitol Hill. Arlette, what's the latest here?

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, House Republican leaders spent almost 90 minutes really cajoling and trying to convince some final Republicans to get on board with a procedural vote to advance this National Defense Authorization Act. Ultimately, they were successful in doing that, but it took a lot of conversation and some assurances offered to some of these lawmakers. Initially, for quite a long time, there had been about five Republicans who voted against this procedural vote.

That included Tim Burchett, Ana Paulina Luna, Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and Thomas Massey. But after some conversations with the speaker and his leadership team, some of these conservative members felt like they got some assurances that would get them on board. Ultimately, there were only two Republicans who voted against this procedural measure on the NDAA from moving forward.

So now this will go up for consideration in the full House, and this will then head to the Senate. This is a must-pass defense policy bill totaling close to $900 billion. And tucked within that is a provision that would require Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to release the full unedited video of that double-tap strike in the Caribbean to congressional committees, and if not, that they would take away part of his funding for his travel budget.

So these are some of the items that were included in that bill, but certainly this was a long process for GOP leaders as they were trying to corral their caucus once again to get on board to advance something that is typically done on a party-line vote.

KEILAR: Another huge issue here is health care, because these Obamacare subsidies are set to expire just in a few weeks. What's the latest from lawmakers? Are they going to extend these?

SAENZ: Well, Brianna, there really does not appear to be any clear end in sight at this moment. Tomorrow, the Senate will be taking up votes on two separate measures, one of those being a Democratic proposal to extend those expiring Obamacare subsidies for three years.

[15:35:00]

The other plan is one that is being put on the floor by Senate Majority Leader John Thune, that instead would address things like health savings accounts but not specifically extend those expiring subsidies.

Both of those plans are expected to fail, which then leaves the major question of what happens next, as these health care premium credits are set to expire in just a few weeks. There have been bipartisan negotiations happening behind the scenes, but there does not appear to be one item that these lawmakers are really coalescing around with divides within the Republican caucus about how to move forward on this. But right now, there are many -- millions of Americans who are staring down potential increases in their health insurance premiums come next year if Congress is unable to act.

KEILAR: Yes, and that will be a rude awakening to them, and certainly to those who represent them. Arlette Saenz, thank you so much, live for us from Capitol Hill.

Coming up, an Army doctor, an OB-GYN, facing new criminal charges after dozens of women accused him of secretly recording his patients. We'll have new details as well on the civil lawsuit next.

[15:40:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: We want to get back to our breaking news. President Trump confirming that the U.S. just seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, a drastic escalation of tensions between the two countries.

Joining us now to discuss from Capitol Hill, Democratic Senator Ruben Gallego of Arizona. Senator, thank you so much for being with us. What's your reaction to this news?

SEN. RUBEN GALLEGO (D-AZ): Look, I got to wait to hear what the rationale for this, under what guise are we doing this? Was it an illegal tanker? What authority do we have?

I mean, if we didn't have any authority to take this tanker, then, you know, that's somewhat piracy. But before we make any type of decision, before I make any conclusions, I want to actually get more information on this. This kind of goes back to a bigger thing that the president's acting in a lawless manner in this area.

He needs to be informing Congress about what his actions are and his goals are. And to a certain degree, he needs to come in and ask for permission for us, which I don't believe he should get, to be clear, to engage in any type of kinetic war in Venezuela.

SANCHEZ: It appears that the president is, at the very least, threatening the idea of conflict with Venezuela as a way to put pressure on Maduro to leave the country. He says that Maduro's days are numbered. I wonder if you would approve of that approach as a way to achieve a dictator being essentially eliminated from that country.

GALLEGO: Look, let's be clear. Venezuela is in a very hard situation. The people of Venezuela are, you know, controlled by an evil, corrupt dictator, without a doubt.

We should do everything we can, short of war, to get this man out. My biggest fear, though, is when you start doing actions like this, when you start playing the drumbeats of war, eventually it does actually escalate into war. And I don't want to go to where the American public is sick of war.

And I don't want our men and women dying in Venezuela for oil and for us to settle some old claims from some Cuban exiles in the 1950s.

SANCHEZ: Congressman, I want to ask you about that controversial second strike and the question of whether the Pentagon should release footage of that second strike on the alleged drug boat on September 2nd. Do you think the American people need to see it, and why?

GALLEGO: I think the American people do need to see it. We used the prestige of the American military, our reputation, to kill these men. Someone ordered these men to be murdered, and the American public should see it for themselves to make a determination, is this the way that we want to conduct ourselves as a country?

Because if this is what we're doing to men that have surrendered, and let's give that maybe they were drug dealers, we don't execute people in the United States for being drug dealers. Why are we destroying and killing these men that are actually giving themselves up after wading in the water for 45 minutes? Now imagine what's going to happen when we potentially invade places like Venezuela if, you know, this administration continues to try to de-synthesize the public to the cost of war, to the humanity in general of what happens during war.

So I do think we should see it. And I think people need to understand this is what happens when you have illegal wars, when the government, the U.S. government, ordered by, essentially by Donald Trump, is murdering people, and something that I think we're going to be extremely embarrassed about as a country.

SANCHEZ: What recourse does Congress have to obtain that video if the Pentagon declines to release it, if Secretary Hegseth decides that it's going to remain classified?

GALLEGO: Look, with these cowards in charge, the Republicans in the House and the Senate, nothing. This is why we need to have control of the House or the Senate, or both, coming into 2026, so we can actually subpoena and force those types of tapes out, so we can actually have oversight, so we can say that the, you know, the U.S. government should not be involved in murder -- government sanctioned murder of individuals in foreign lands, or not even foreign lands, on the oceans.

You know, this is the type of thing that our forefathers used to rail against and made sure there was a lot of guardrail, but the guardrails were there with the assumption that there would be a, you know, bipartisan approach to keeping the power of the executive in check and not allowing them to use, you know, the military in an unwarranted manner.

That clearly is not happening. So therefore, we need to have a checks and balance, we need to actually have Democrats in charge and actually trying to stop this and show the type of abuse that's happening.

[15:45:00]

SANCHEZ: Senator, we have to pause the conversation there because we have to go over to the White House where President Donald Trump is taking questions from reporters. Let's listen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir, there's a new proposal from DHS that would see tourists from a lot of countries have to hand over five years of social media history to get a tourist visa. Are you concerned at all that if that's implemented, there would be a decline in tourism next year? And what sort of concern do you think it would have?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No, we're doing so well. We just want people to come over here and safe. We want safety.

We want security. We want to make sure we're not letting the wrong people come into our country. We're getting rid of a lot of bad ones from jails, from mental institutions, drug dealers.

We're getting a lot of a lot of bad people, murderers, 11,888 murderers, half of them, almost exactly half of them committed more than one murder. We're getting rid of them. In some cases, we don't even want to get them out.

We put them in jail because we're afraid they're going to come back into our country. We're not going to let them back in. So we've taken a very tough stand.

And you see where we've been, like Washington, D.C., now people walk down the streets. They go into restaurants at night. It's beautiful.

It's like this beautiful thing to see, because until I got here, this was a very, very bad place. We had a terrible thing happen two weeks ago with terrorism with regard to two National Guards people that are so phenomenal. One is no longer with us and one, amazingly, we weren't looking with great hope on that, you know, that Andrew.

And today, he got out of bed, actually, got stood up, didn't say anything. It's a little early. But the chances of Andrew, other than his mother, who said, nope, he's going to be OK.

His mother was the most positive person and could be that she'll be right. It's pretty amazing. Made progress.

It was both of them were so badly hurt. We never we never thought that one could survive. So it looks like Andrew's doing pretty well.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The winner of the Nobel Prize dedicated the prize to you, the Nobel Peace Prize, and she in Venezuela, very, very committed to the ceremony. There is a risk she would be arrested. What would happen if she's arrested?

What message do you send or would you send to Nicolas Maduro?

TRUMP: Well, arrested by who? The Nobel Prize Committee? It sounds like that's probably the ones that would arrest.

I don't know. I think about it. She was very gracious.

She said I should have gotten the Nobel Prize. And I don't you know, I mean, I'm doing this to save lives. I'm not doing it for any other reason.

But no, I don't like if she would be arrested. I wouldn't be happy with that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, the Senate Republicans currently have a health care proposal that would take away, let those subsidies expire and then put about a thousand dollars in people's HSAs. Do you think that is enough money and how do you ensure that people who will see those tax subsidies expire won't see their health care costs skyrocket?

TRUMP: Well, the Unaffordable Care Act, which is Obamacare, they call it now the unaffordable because it's unaffordable. It used to be called the affordable, but it was never affordable. It was always bad.

It was basically designed for the benefit of insurance companies. And what we're doing is we want all of the billions and billions of dollars that went to insurance companies to go directly to the people and they can buy their own health care. And people love it.

I don't know if the Democrats are going to approve it because they want the insurance companies to make money. It was a scam. Obamacare was a scam.

But we're going to see. I mean, we, the Republicans, I can tell you, want the money to go to the people. And we're winning that battle.

The Democrats are having a hard time with it because they're in the pocket of the insurance companies. Yes, please.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You spoke to some European leaders today, I think, sir.

TRUMP: I did.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Could you tell us about that? And is there a revised peace plan that Ukraine has presented?

TRUMP: The leaders of France, we spoke to, and Germany and UK, all very good leaders, very good friends of mine. And we discussed Ukraine in pretty strong words. And we'll see what happens.

I mean, we're waiting to hear answers before we progress. You know, we're not spending any money in Ukraine. We're selling basically missiles and everything else to NATO.

And NATO is paying us. And then they distribute it to who they want. I guess they're mostly distributing to Ukraine.

But we're not spending money. But you know, we are. We're spending a lot of time and a lot of effort.

Because last month, 27,000 soldiers were killed. Both -- think of it, 27 -- let's say if you take a football game and take half the stadium, that's 27,000. So 27,000 soldiers were killed.

[15:50:00]

Russian and Ukrainian soldiers were killed. And I want to see that stop. We'll find out. Look, there are a lot of things happening right now. A lot of people say it's closer than it's ever been.

It's a war that would have never started. If I were president, it would have never started. It's a war that should never have started.

But we'll have it figured out, I think, within a pretty short time.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You say very strong terms. Could you explain that?

TRUMP: Well, I think we had some little disputes about people. And we're going to see how it turns out.

And we said, before we go to a meeting, we want to know some things. You know, they want a -- they would like us to go to a meeting over the weekend in Europe. And we'll make a determination depending on what they come back with.

We don't want to be -- we don't want to be wasting time. Sometimes you have to let people fight it out, and sometimes you don't. But the problem with letting people fight it out is you're losing thousands of people a week.

It's ridiculous. The whole thing is ridiculous.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, two questions. One, the oil tanker, who owns that oil tanker?

TRUMP: You'll get that information later.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK, and have you spoken to Maduro since your last conversation?

TRUMP: No, I haven't.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You only did one conversation? And when you say that the European leaders want to have a meeting over the weekend, are you talking about with Zelenskyy or with them? TRUMP: With Zelenskyy and us.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And you said in an interview yesterday that you think it's time for Zelenskyy to start accepting things. What things are you talking about?

TRUMP: I think he has to be realistic. And I do wonder about, you know, how long is it going to be until they have an election. It's a democracy.

It's a long time. They haven't had an election in a long time. He's losing a lot of people.

And it's possible that the people, if you look at the polls, I will say 82 percent -- there was a poll that came out -- 82 percent of the people are demanding a settlement be made, Ukrainian people. They want to see a settlement be made. I understand that they're losing thousands and thousands of people a week.

They want to see it ended. And I do say, you know, at what point, when do they have an election in Ukraine? That's not casting dispersions on anybody, but they do have a massive corruption situation going on there.

And they do say, you know, when are they? People are asking this question. When do they have an election?

Are they going to have an election? Or are they going to just keep it going like this? So, I think it's time to get that war settled.

And I think it's a war that can be settled. But it takes two a -- two to tango.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, you talked a lot about the new orders of Warner Brothers Discovery to make changes at CNN, big changes in Kennedy. You spoke to Jared about it. What are you doing with him?

Or did you sort of wall him off a little bit?

TRUMP: So, what do you want to know?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What changes do you want to see at CNN under Newell? Well, I'm not involved in that.

I will be probably involved, maybe involved in the decision. It depends. You have some good companies bidding on it.

I think the people that have run CNN for the last long period of time are a disgrace. I think it's imperative that CNN be sold because you certainly wouldn't want to put people, just leave those people with some money, good money, and CNN so that, you know, they can spend even more money spreading poison because it's lies. It's a disgrace.

So, I wouldn't want to see the same company end up with CNN, the same company with money because right now they don't have too much money. But they have value, I guess, based on the bids. They've got value.

But I think CNN should be sold because I think the people that are running CNN right now are either corrupt or incompetent.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And that may not be a factor in the decision-making because you know we've got some --

TRUMP: Well, in my mind, but I, you know, I can be talked out of that by some very talented people that we have, antitrust people. But I just think that the people that have run CNN, into the ground, by the way, nobody watches, very few people watch. I don't think they should be entrusted with running CNN any longer.

So, I think any deal, it should be guaranteed and certain that CNN is part of it. Or sold separately. But I don't think the people that are running that company right now and running CNN, which is a very dishonest group of people, I don't think that should be allowed to continue.

I think CNN should be sold along with everything else.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, you spoke about affordability earlier in your remarks and yesterday in Pennsylvania. How much more can we expect to see you on the road kind of delivering that message? And are you worried at all about the Democrats winning a couple more things in Miami and Georgia?

TRUMP: I don't worry about it. It's like, statistically, it's amazing.

[15:55:00]

When you win the presidency, even if you win by a landslide like we did, and even if you do a good job, and some people say we've done the best opening 10 months in history, in the history of the presidents, I think we have.

Who's done better? We ended eight wars. We have the strongest economy. We have $18 trillion coming in, which is more than any country had times, I think, five or six.

Eighteen trillion's a lot even in your standard, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, sir.

TRUMP: Even for that guy. Eighteen trillion's big numbers. But we have $18 trillion coming in. Pretty amazing, right?

I think Qualcomm would be very impressed if they had even a little piece of that. But -- so we've done a great job. But for whatever reason, and nobody's been able to give me an answer, when you win the presidency, you seem to lose the midterms.

Even if you win the presidency by a lot and you do a great job as president. You know, some presidents have done good and they've lost, I think it's like two times in the last many, many years it's been won. I don't know why. It doesn't make sense. Usually I can figure things out, but I don't know why, but that seems to be. But other than that, we should win because we're doing great.

The economy is roaring. I think the economy is only going to go, you know, better with all this money pouring in. We have factories being built.

And forget about AI. We have AI more than anybody. We're leading AI by a lot.

But we have many car companies coming in from Canada, from Mexico. They're closing up. They're coming in from Mexico.

They're coming in from Canada, from Japan, from Europe, all over Europe, Germany, all over Europe. I mean, we're doing great. But for whatever reason, it doesn't matter how well they're doing, you know, good and bad.

The bad, you understand, but even when a president is doing well, they seem to not do well in the midterms. So we're going to try and change it. There should be no reason for it.

If anybody at the table can figure out, Bruce, a nice psychological reason. But so I want to win. And winning the midterms is important.

People want us to win the midterms. And I think we have great spirit. We should win the midterms, yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: On the Biden's administration during COVID specifically, Biden removed the safety standards on abortion drugs. Now I'm hearing from a lot of pro-lifers that they're very anxious because yesterday, Bloomberg reported that your FDA is slow walking a review of the abortion drugs that Secretary Kennedy promised.

TRUMP: Yes, I mean, I'll find out. I'll ask them. I don't think they're slow walking anything, but I'll find out.

Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can we update on the clashes between Thailand and Cambodia?

TRUMP: Yes, I think I'll have to make a phone call. I was going to say that Thailand and Cambodia, one of the eight that are settled, they've been fighting for a long time. They've been fighting for a very long time.

Many, many, many decades. But I got along great with both. I found they were two great leaders, two great people.

And I settled it once. I think I can do it pretty quickly. I think we're scheduling a phone call tomorrow.

(INAUDIBLE)

TRUMP: With Thailand.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)

TRUMP: With Thailand, if you, you know, just to answer Steve.

With Thailand and Cambodia, I think I can get them to stop fighting. Who else can do that? Think of it.

Settled eight wars. Every once in a while, one will flame up again, and I have to put out that little flame. I have to put it out, but we're going to put it out again.

So I think I'm scheduled to speak to them tomorrow and see if I can. It was unfortunate what happened. I mean, I know exactly what happened.

It got it started a little bit, but we'll see if we can put it out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're interested in the seizure of this tanker. What happens to the oil on this ship?

TRUMP: Well, we keep it, I guess.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where does it go? What port does it go to?

TRUMP: Well, you have to follow the tanker. You know, you're a good newsman. Just follow the tanker.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: DO you know where it's going?

TRUMP: Follow it. Get a helicopter. Follow the tanker.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is it true it's going to keep the oil?

TRUMP: But we're going to -- I assume we're going to keep the oil.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, on that chair, Kevin Hassett said you were going to announce your decision within the next two weeks. Is that correct?

TRUMP: Are you? Maybe.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you doing your interviews with finalists today?

TRUMP: Well, I'm meeting with Kevin Walsh today, so I'm meeting with him. I sort of have a very good idea of what I'm looking for. Again, I'm looking for somebody that will be honest with interest rates.

That's all I just want, honestly. Our rates should be much lower. Our rates should be the lowest rates in the world because all these countries that you see, you know, with low rates, many of them are low because of us, because they suck so much money out of us.

But that's not happening anymore. We should have the lowest rates in the world. And without us, none of them really exist as an economy. I mean, I can show you these really prime, really wonderful countries. They've had nothing but success. It's because they took so much out of the United States.

I mean, it's one of those little problems. I want to see that when we do well, we're rewarded for doing well, not the way it's been for the last pretty long period ...

END