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U.S. Seizes Oil Tanker Off Venezuelan Coast; Three Dissenting Votes Cast In Interest Rate Decision; Lawsuit: Cruise Passenger Who Died Was Served 33 Drinks. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired December 11, 2025 - 07:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:30:55]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: So there are new details this morning about this escalation between the United States and Venezuela. U.S. forces seizing a ship allegedly used to transport sanctioned oil off the country's coast.

The Trump administration released video of the operation and you're seeing it here. Armed forces rappelling from a helicopter onto the deck of the ship. Satellite images reviewed by CNN also show that the ship's operators were trying to hide its true location while it was docked at a Venezuelan oil terminal last month.

It was sanctioned in 2022 as well for facilitating oil trade for Hezbollah and Iran's Revolutionary Guard. And also was, this time, sailing under a false Guyana flag, according to that country's maritime authority.

As for the oil on board, President Trump told reporters, "I guess we keep it." A lot of questions though of what this all means going forward.

Joining me right now is retired Admiral James Stavridis, a CNN senior military analyst and former NATO Supreme Allied Commander and also led Southern Command for years and has huge experience in this area. Admiral, it's great to see you again.

How big of an escalation is this? When you heard this happened what were you thinking?

ADM. JAMES STAVRIDIS (RET.), CNN SENIOR MILITARY ANALYST, FORMER NATO SUPREME ALLIED COMMANDER, PARTNER, THE CARLYLE GROUP (via Webex by Cisco): Uh, three levels. Number one, tactically.

Hey, let's just pause for a moment and say this is the U.S. Coast Guard. This is not Navy SEALS. These are the people that rescue you when you're a boater on Memorial Day. Here they are dropping out of a helicopter and taking down this ship. And oh, by the way, from everything I can see, this operation was flawless.

This is legal. This is a vessel that's under sanction. This is law enforcement doing it. That's Coast Guard. They're law enforcement. Not a single casualty. And I'll point out we can now take those crew members and interrogate them and find out where, why, when and how of this mission.

So a high-end tactical mission. Well done, Coast Guard.

Number two, operationally, Kate, when you step back and look at the theater, here is your question. How much pressure does this put on Maduro? Answer: a lot because this kicks him right where it really hurts -- money. This is how Venezuela gets its money doing these kind of shady oil deals around the world.

So in addition to all the other activities going on that you and I have been talking about, now you've got this economic pressure at work. That, I think, is additive to what the Trump administration is trying to do but note it's short of launching strikes ashore. So it's kind of a Goldilocks in the middle escalation.

Third and finally, Kate, worth pointing out strategically if you're in Moscow, you're in Beijing, you're in Tehran, this worries you. This is how you're moving oil around the world and it shows you a capability and an intent to shut that down.

I think that's the three things that are really top of mind for me.

BOLDUAN: Is -- this is a really interesting move and also interesting to hear you describe it as kind of a Goldilocks escalation because you --

STAVRIDIS: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: Sen. Rand Paul, who has questioned and been against any of this military intervention that we've seen in the Caribbean from jump -- he called this with the oil tanker, in his view, basically initiating war. The way he put it is, like, this sounds a lot like the beginning of a war.

Do you -- do you see that?

STAVRIDIS: Uh, I think it's in the eye of the beholder, so I'll give you three viewpoints.

If you're Nicolas Maduro, I agree with the senator. This is a pretty steady escalation toward significant combat. It's kind of the last stop before strikes. So from Caracas' perspective, yeah, it looks like war.

From Washington, you could legitimately say this is law enforcement 101. This is a tanker full of illegal oil seized under legal authority by a law enforcement organization. All that is a different viewpoint.

[07:35:07]

If you're in Moscow or Tehran, or Beijing, you're worried about it and you're going to talk about it as piracy on the high seas. So as usual, the event has three different ways of looking at it. On

this one, I think Washington probably has it about right. This is illegal activity. We sent law enforcement to shut it down.

BOLDUAN: Real quick on this, though. This is law enforcement going in and doing law enforcement action, as you -- as you said.

Does this serve as confirmation or what does this say about the goal of the -- the actual goal of the military campaign in the Caribbean? Does it -- does this now confirm that the goal is actually going beyond what the stated purpose is when it comes to the boat strikes, which was the only reason we're there is to stop the flow of drugs?

STAVRIDIS: You are totally right, Kate Bolduan. What's happening is we are now seeing the layers of the onion open up and you're going to see continued boat strikes like we've been talking about. Now you're going to see these oil tanker seizures. And I think if Maduro doesn't wake up and jump out, I think that pot that we're boiling him in is going to get hotter and hotter. Sooner or later that frog, Maduro, is going to jump out of that pot.

BOLDUAN: Admiral, it's great to see you. Thank you, as always. I really appreciate it -- John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: You are totally right, Kate Bolduan.

BOLDUAN: Well, that's why he always gets invited back.

BERMAN: It just -- it just feeds the ego there.

BOLDUAN: That's right.

BERMAN: Stavridis is back four times every show just to tell Kate how great her questions are.

All right. This morning we were struck by two messages on the president's behavior on the economy. And these two messages came from very, very different people but they sounded very, very similar.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST, "JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE!": He told the MAGA faithful who are having trouble making ends meet that their kids don't need so many dolls or pencils. He said -- he said you only need a couple of dolls and one or two pencils. The guy who bedazzled this room in gold thinks your child has too many pencils at school.

His strategy, it seems, is to just keep saying things are great, which is the same mistake Joe Biden made, by the way. You can't just tell people the economy is good when they're paying more for everything. We know how much things cost.

REP. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-GA): The president needs to be aware that he's a billionaire, President of the United States, and you can't gaslight people and tell them that their bills are affordable. And you can't tell them that the economy is an A-plus-plus-plus. You just can't do that. And I think it's insulting to people's intelligence.

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BERMAN: All right. With us now Democratic strategist Ameshia Cross and Republican strategist Doug Heye.

And Doug, admittedly, that was Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican from Georgia, and Jimmy Kimmel, who has a late-night --

DOUG HEYE, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST, FORMER RNC COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: Yeah.

BERMAN: -- show on ABC. And admittedly, Marjorie Taylor Greene is different than she probably was six months ago. But still, she and Jimmy Kimmel don't exactly drink from the same fountain here.

So what does it tell you that they have nearly identical messages now on the president's new affordability tour?

HEYE: Yeah. It shows that Trump is missing the message here where he generally has been good in how he communicates on the economy. It certainly was a huge benefit for him in the 2024 campaign.

And John, let me be clear. My Stretch Armstrong and my Steve Austin with the bionic eye -- those were action figures. They were not dolls. But if I'm Donald Trump, I typically would say you buy as many action figures or dolls or pencils as you want because we're America. We're big, we're bold, we're brash, and you can have all the great things.

This is a very different message from Donald Trump and it's not going to resonate, especially with those Independent voters who maybe didn't love Donald Trump, maybe didn't love Kamala Harris, but voted for Trump. These are people who are looking for specific answers to where the economy is and where it's going, and they want some solutions from Trump, and that's not what they're hearing.

BERMAN: By the way, I had the Bigfoot action figure from "SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN." I really did.

HEYE: Oh, that was a good one.

BERMAN: That was a good one.

HEYE: That was a good one.

BERMAN: It was a good one, played on the show itself by Andre the Giant, of course.

Ameshia, I'm sorry to put you through this, but let me ask you about when you hear Jimmy Kimmel say this is the same mistake that Joe Biden made. As a Democrat, are you watching this saying oh, here we go again?

AMESHIA CROSS, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST, FORMER OBAMA CAMPAIGN ADVISER: I think that the -- we've seen those lines drawn before. At the end of the -- at the end of the day, Joe Biden did the CHIPS Act. Joe Biden did the Infrastructure Development Act. Joe Biden was working very strategically to bring down a lot of the costs, specifically as it related to inflation. And we know that it just didn't get to the point where most Americans felt comfortable. But we still had the lowest inflationary cost of anybody in the -- in the globe.

So I think that's very important to put this into context. His policies needed more time.

[07:40:00]

What we have with Donald Trump is policies that do not meet the affordability crisis. This is a guy who signed into law the Big Beautiful Bill Act, which is the largest wealth transfer that the American people have ever seen. This is a guy who believes in a tariff strategy that is a tax on the American consumer. This is a guy who continues to basically, you know, make policy -- make policies that create opportunities for Americans' prices to continue to rise.

He's also led in the eradication of jobs. We saw that with the slicing and dicing of DOGE. We've seen it with his pushes against anti-DEI. We've seen it time and again.

Right now you have hundreds of thousands of people in America who are out of work or underemployed. They cannot afford the cost of living, be it whether it's housing, food. Again, a tariff -- a tariff issue there.

The problem is his policies. It's not just his rhetoric; it is that the policies he has enacted have created an environment that is unsustainable for the average American family.

Meanwhile, he's off at Mar-a-Lago throwing, you know, Great Gatsby parties. He's living his best life and telling us not to believe our paychecks and not to believe our wallets.

BERMAN: Doug, you spent a lot of your adult life in the Halls of Congress, and Congress -- by the way, talking about healthcare. You wasted a lot of your adult life, I think, in the middle of healthcare arguments.

HEYE: Wasted, yes.

BERMAN: I mean -- I mean, you would say given how hard it was.

What do you see among Republicans in Congress this morning when you have in the House and in the Senate for that matter some Republicans now starting to propose their own plans to extend Obamacare subsidies for different durations sort of against what their leadership is proposing right now?

HEYE: Yeah. It seems that they are dealing with sort of the resistible force and the moveable object. And it's a real challenge for Republicans, one, because they've never been able to -- and this is what I dealt with specifically in 2014 every week for six months where we couldn't even put a white paper together on what our healthcare policy was. Republicans in Congress, right now, are making it clear they want to

do something, but do something is not a legislative strategy and it makes it hard to see what actually might emerge from Congress in the coming days. And especially to be mindful of the fact that we're coming up, John, on the Christmas holidays and so they're running out of time for what to do.

We hear a lot about discharge petitions, and they get a lot of attention and I understand why. I've dealt with them myself. But the reality is if a discharge petition is filed and filed successfully, which is very hard to do, the speaker still has seven days legislatively of which to deal with that, which means we're already talking January. A new year, a new set of priorities, and an election year, making it that much harder to do things.

BERMAN: Um, I don't want to get too much into the nitty gritty of discharge petitions, Ameshia, but there are now at least two that deal specifically with extending Obamacare subsidies that have the backing of some Republicans. All the Democrats signed onto either one of those.

What kind of pressure does that put on Democratic leadership to maybe join hands with some of the so-called moderate Republicans to get an extension? Maybe not the full one that they want but at least a partial extension.

CROSS: Well, if Republicans come to the table and they vote in the likeness -- in the likeness of the American people who want to make sure that they have healthcare, who want to make sure that those costs aren't -- you know, aren't forcing them to choose between whether they can keep their lights on and eat or get that prescription drug, I think that Democrats are definitely going to align.

The ball is in the court of the Republicans now and the reason why many of them are coming to -- coming to the table is quite frankly because Democrats have shown sizable gains across the country in formerly what was thought as Republican districts. And at this point they don't want to see the bleed continue throughout the midterms. So they know that they're going to have to do something about affordability and at the top of the affordability market is healthcare. That's why these discussions are happening.

BERMAN: It is interesting though. Leader Jeffries hasn't come down with an opinion yet definitively on either on of these discharge petitions. So we'll see -- we'll see if he puts his weight behind some of them because that could push at least one thing through.

It's good seeing you both this morning. Thank you -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: New this morning the outbreak of infant botulism is actually a bigger outbreak than first thought. The CDC is now expanding its warning about the illnesses linked to now-recalled baby formula from the company ByHeart. Health officials say 51 infants in 19 states have gotten sick.

And the CDC says that it is also not ruling out contamination across all of ByHeart's products. They're still investigating. They're broadening the outbreak now to include all illnesses reported since the company began production in March of 2022.

Also this morning we are keeping a close eye on market futures. We're going to give you a show of that at some point. We'll show it to you. It'll come.

[07:45:00]

It comes after a rally on Wall Street yesterday -- there you go -- mixed for you. A rally on Wall Street yesterday. Investors are responding to the Federal Reserve delivering its third consecutive rate cut this year. This time it was cut by a quarter of a point. But the decision came with an unsual amount of opposition from within the Fed policy meeting.

CNN's Matt Egan is on this one for us. You've been watching it all day yesterday, all through it. What does this mean now?

MATT EGAN, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Well Kate, the Fed is signaling a strategy shift for 2026, right? This year was all about weathering the policy storm out of Washington and cushioning the blow to the job market by dropping interest rates to three-year lows.

Now Fed chair Jerome Powell is saying that the Fed is in "wait and see" mode. He repeatedly said during yesterday's press conference that Fed officials believe that rates are in a good place. And that gives them time to wait and see how the economy evolves and reacts to these interest rate cuts, to tariffs, to the immigration crackdown.

And look, this is an increasingly divided Fed and it's one that does not seem like it's in any rush to further lower interest rates, right? Fed officials are only penciling in one interest rate cut next year, and that's in part because they struck a very optimistic tone about 2026. They significantly upgraded their GDP forecast. They expect the economy to speed up. They see nothing close to a recession.

They do expect inflation will cool down next year because they suspect that the impact of tariffs is going to start to fade. We'll have to wait and see if they're right on that, but that's what they think is going to happen.

And they don't see the job market falling apart. They see the unemployment rate at the end of next year at 4.4 percent. That's exactly where it was as of the most recent jobs report, which was in September.

Now, during the press conference, I asked Fed Chair Powell about the fact he's only got three more meetings left at the helm of the Federal Reserve and what he wants his legacy to be. Take a listen to his answer.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEROME POWELL, CHAIR, FEDERAL RESERVE: My legacy? I -- my thought is that I really want to turn this job over to whoever replaces me in -- with the economy in really good shape. That's what I want to do. I want -- I want inflation to be under control coming back down to two percent, and I want the labor market to be strong. That's what I want.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

EGAN: Now his answers revealing, in a sense, that despite all of the political pressure from the White House on the Fed and on Powell himself -- he says he just focused on doing his job -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: All right, Matt Egan. Thank you so much -- John.

BERMAN: All right. This morning a new lawsuit as a cruise ship passenger died after being served at least 33 drinks.

And how would you like to own a treasured piece of "Star Wars" history? You can put it right next to your lightsaber for a mere $4 million.

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[07:52:35]

BOLDUAN: This morning the family of a man who died after being detained on a Royal Caribbean cruise ship is suing the company. The wrongful death lawsuit claims that Michael Virgil was served more than 30 alcoholic drinks during his trip in December of 2024. According to the suit, the family's cabin was not ready when they boarded, and they were directed to the bar area to wait. The suit then alleges over the course of the next few hours Virgil was served 33 drinks.

Images that were released show cruise ship personnel restraining a passenger believe to be him -- were doing this later. The lawsuit says that he got lost while eventually trying to find his room and he began kicking cabin doors, and he became "agitated" with crew members. About eight hours after boarding, the lawsuit says security restrained him using "excessive force." He was pronounced dead about an hour and a half later.

The family's attorney says that -- says that him being overserved and the crew's restraint are responsible for Virgil's death. The medical examiner has ruled it a homicide.

Joining me right now is CNN legal analyst and criminal defense attorney Joey Jackson. A lot of questions around all of this, Joey. What is Royal Caribbean facing here.

JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY, FORMER PROSECUTOR: Uh, it could be quite a bit. So Kate, good morning. Any case turns on its facts though.

BOLDUAN: Right.

JACKSON: So Royal Caribbean certainly has a responsibility but so does the individual, and that's basically the law.

So maritime law is going to apply here because it happened on the high seas. And essentially, what's going to occur is they're going to do an assessment.

Number one, what duty do you owe a common carrier? What duty do you owe passengers that are in your care? That is the duty to act reasonably. Ensure that they're safe and that they're secure, in addition to having the good time that they have. Having adequate medical staff available to assist them. Making sure your staff is trained, et cetera.

Number two, do you breach that duty when you visibly -- and this is an allegation -- see a person who is intoxicated and you continue to serve them? There's an obligation to stop, to assess them, and if they're not ready then to stop.

And then the other thing is that the issue is going to be is did that cause, right, the ultimate death?

And so there's a lot of layers here, Kate. One is the alcohol, as you mentioned.

BOLDUAN: Right.

JACKSON: The other is the excessive force because the medical examiner, when they investigated, determined that he had asphyxia because of the positioning that they were on his body and how --

[07:55:00]

BOLDUAN: Hmm.

JACKSON: -- they laid him. And so as a result of that, that's what caused his death.

But you do have a duty as a common carrier, but the individual has a responsibility, too. And interestingly enough, what they do when these cases go to court -- to trial is they assess liability. They say hey, you know what? Kate was 30 percent liable, I'm 70 percent, and therefore they reduce the award by the amount of your liability. Very true. That's what happens.

BOLDUAN: The fact that this happened on a ship, not necessarily on land, does that change things at all?

JACKSON: So it does change things, but what it does is it changes the law that applies, right?

BOLDUAN: OK.

JACKSON: So in the event -- this was a cruise that was from Los Angeles to Mexico. You're not going to apply Mexican law. You're not going to apply the law --

BOLDUAN: Hmm.

JACKSON: -- of Los Angeles. The lawsuit is filed in Miami because that's where Royal Caribbean is headquartered.

BOLDUAN: OK.

JACKSON: But what you're going to do is they have this law and it's essentially the law of the high seas. It's the High Seas Act and you apply that. And the standards of that act do provide for ensuring that a common carrier exercises its duties responsibly.

People go on cruise ships, people drink, people have fun. But to what extent do you as a common carrier have an obligation to ensure that they're medically trained, that they're responsible, et cetera?

And one of the other allegations is they literally put his body in a refrigerator. And as a result of that there was some deterioration, which caused the problem with the viewing, et cetera --

BOLDUAN: Hmm.

JACKSON: -- later on.

BOLDUAN: Hmm, hmm, hmm.

Um, when it comes to responsibility --

JACKSON: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: -- and you list out the allegations in the lawsuit, what -- when -- let's say, a judge is looking at this and analyzing this. Where does personal responsibility come in?

JACKSON: Yes.

BOLDUAN: Like, how is that analyzed?

JACKSON: It's analyzed in a very specific way, right? So the liability -- certainly, you can go after the common carrier --

BOLDUAN: Yeah.

JACKSON: -- and say they have a duty, and say the staff needs to be trained and medical attention should have been afforded, and perhaps there was too much force that was used in a situation. But they also look at the individual and they say look, should you have been having 33 drinks? Should your actions have been as belligerent as they were, right? Should you have perhaps not engaged in the behavior you were engaging in?

And literally, what ends up happening is there's a percentage. It's quantified.

BOLDUAN: Wow.

JACKSON: It's -- legitimately, they say hey, you were 20 percent at fault, 30 percent, 40 percent, 60 percent -- whatever it is. And then the number that you get if there's liability for Royal Caribbean is reduced by your liability. That's how they assess personal conduct to the carrier's conduct.

BOLDUAN: Fascinating. All right. Much more to come here.

Joey, thank you.

JACKSON: Of course.

BOLDUAN: It is good to see you.

JACKSON: Thanks, Kate.

BOLDUAN: John.

BERMAN: All right.

This morning new video of a Virginia state trooper saving a man trapped inside a burning car. The trooper found the car on fire after it had crashed into a tree during a snowstorm.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

S. PAGE, VIRGINIA STATE POLICE SERGEANT: And I think it literally happened seconds before I pulled up. So yeah, if I hadn't gone northbound, I don't know if he -- if anybody else was going to stop.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: The car was locked. The trooper broke the window, punctured the airbag, and pulled the driver out. That driver did suffer serious injuries from the crash.

So a show at a wildlife park came to an abrupt halt after a bear attacked its handler just moments before going on stage. Other staffers tried to intervene there to break the two apart. When they did finally pull the bear away from the handler, which you can see there, the handler then goes back after the bear for a second there -- at least seemed to. So obviously, the whole thing went on. The park later released a statement saying neither were injured but promised to make changes to its emergency response.

So an experienced hiker trapped in quicksand, according to CNN affiliate Fox 13. Austin Dirks got stuck for two hours hiking Arches National Park in Utah. You can see a little bit of it there. He was able to get in touch with a rescue team using a GPS satellite messenger which, by the way, are must-haves for anyone going on hikes in remote places.

And one of the most significant pieces of "Star Wars" history has been sold. Tom Jung's original painting for "Star Wars" as sold for $3.9 million. The painting and poster it inspired was such a big deal when the film launched. Really, it's the bottom part -- the bottom left- hand part that everyone remembers but we're not really showing -- 50 years ago. This was such a big deal for all of us who were around then.

The sale set a record for the highest priced piece of memorabilia from the "Star Wars" franchise and in general for any movie poster artwork.

I've got to walk closer because there's no way I can actually see what's going through -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: Um, and for -- if anyone was questioning, John Berman is a huge "Star Wars" fan.

BERMAN: Yes.

BOLDUAN: So this --

BERMAN: As are everyone in the studio.

BOLDUAN: I mean, are you doing this right now?

BERMAN: Everyone important in the studio.

BOLDUAN: Anyone who has -- everyone who has seen the movies, maybe -- maybe.

Let's turn to this right now.