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Savannah Guthrie's Mom Missing; Trump Calls for Nationalized Elections; Musk Merges Two Companies; DHS Deploying Body Cameras. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired February 03, 2026 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:00]

JEFF MOON, FORMER ASSISTANT U.S. TRADE REPRESENTATIVE TO CHINA: Help Chinese interests and probably not help American interests too much.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Look at --

MOON: So, but that also, probably not coincidentally -- go ahead.

BOLDUAN: I was just going to say, looking at the long-term problem here. If the United States wants to cut the dependance on China, as it's understood China has a deep and durable monopoly when it comes to rare earths, Bessent said in November, and I took note of this, that the U.S. can break that dominance in just one to two years. What's the realistic timeline if they really want to put money to trying to break the dependance on China?

MOON: That statement is incorrect. This is an effort involving many years. You need to do a whole variety of things, from changing mine permitting policies here in the U.S., to coordinating with other countries. And then bringing production online is years out as well. So, the Trump administration is doing a variety of things in a variety of areas. One question I have is, who's in charge of all this? And how are we sure that it's going to be coordinated? It seems like it's Donald Trump, but we really need to have an overall project coordinator.

BOLDUAN: Yes, that will extend past a Trump administration to really pull it off.

Jeff, you raise important questions here. It's great to have your perspective. Thank you so much.

A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: New this morning, authorities calling on the public to help them find Nancy Guthrie, the mother of "Today" show anchor Savannah Guthrie. We're getting new reports just in that there was blood found in her home.

President Trump says Republicans should take over the voting in at least 15 places. Never mind the Constitution. We've got new reaction to this, this morning. And for those of you not nervous, too nervous, to eat during the Super

Bowl, how much will those snacks cost? And don't even pretend to be thinking about vegetables.

I'm John Berman, with Kate Bolduan and Sara Sidner. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: We begin with breaking news. An update by authorities in the case of "Today" show anchor Savannah Guthrie's mother, who police believe has been abducted. "The Los Angeles Times" is reporting now that authorities are saying they found blood in Nancy Guthrie's home. Authorities believe the 84-year-old was taken from her bed in Arizona sometime between Saturday night and Sunday morning, and they are now asking the public for help to find her. On Instagram, Savannah Guthrie has been thanking supporters, also asking for their help. She says, "raise your prayers with us and believe with us that she will be lifted by them in this very moment. Bring her home."

CNN's Marybel Gonzalez is at the Pima County Sheriff's Department with the very latest on the case.

MARYBEL GONZALEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Time is of the essence in this case. The search for Nancy Guthrie growing more urgent by the minute. And that is because investigators say she takes daily medication, and that is critical to her health. And as we know, several days have now passed since officials say she was taken from her home in the middle of the night and against her will.

Nancy Guthrie was last seen Saturday by family members who dropped her off at home, where I should mention she lives alone. And it's when she failed to show up to church the following day that she was reported missing.

Now, as far as how investigators say they believe she was abducted, they're being very tight lipped about those details, only sharing with us that when detectives showed up to the home, they found evidence that they deemed to be concerning.

Now, when asked whether this could be a case dealing with kidnaping for ransom, given Savannah Guthrie's public persona, they said that that is not the direction investigators are taking. However, they are not discarding any possibilities.

Meanwhile, officials here are asking the community to help them with this investigation to look through their home footage and submit any tips or any suspicious activity that they could report to help bring Miss Nancy Guthrie home.

Reporting in Tucson, Arizona, I'm Marybel Gonzalez.

SIDNER: And you saw there, there is a number that you can call if you have any information that will help find Nancy Guthrie.

Kate. BOLDUAN: All right, joining us right now to talk about this search,

CNN law enforcement analyst Jonathan Wackrow.

Jonathan, just read one more time what we now can -- what we're now learning from "The L.A. Times." It says authorities found blood inside the Tucson home of Nancy Guthrie, according to law enforcement sources, which, of course, is heightening concerns about that -- that the mother of Savannah Guthrie was a victim of foul play.

[09:05:02]

That heightens things, of course. When you learn that and you add that into the language that you've been hearing from law enforcement around all of this from the beginning, what do you see in this?

JONATHAN WACKROW, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, Kate, good morning.

And you're absolutely right, you know, law enforcement -- law enforcement's language from the very beginning really reflects, you know, evidence. And now that we have this evidence of blood found at the site, further supports that this was not speculation of her abduction, that there is a working, you know, criminal theory here that she was abducted.

And, you know, that word abduction by law enforcement is not a word that is used lightly. It's really this designation that follows very clear indicators of third-party involvement from a criminal perspective. You know, in -- you know, as we now know, the authorities are treating the residence as a crime scene. And again, it's the working belief that the disappearance was not self-initiated.

And now we're starting to see the mosaic of evidence starting to come together with the reporting that there was blood found at the site. These are all indicators that, you know, this was not self-initiated, but that a third-party criminal act was involved.

And again, investigators, right now, are looking at, what are those signs? Was there forced entry? Was there signs of a struggle that led to, you know, some sort of injury or wound that would yield that that discovery of blood? Was there any other type of unexplained property disturbance?

So, again, the fact that they found blood at the residence further supports their language from the very beginning and just reinforces how critical it is to identify a suspect and find Ms. Guthrie.

BOLDUAN: You list out some of -- obviously they're looking at everything, of course, but officials are saying there's no ransom note. It isn't a robbery. They're not ruling anything out, though. What -- are their common -- and there's nothing common about any abduction or any missing person. I want to say that. But is there a -- are there common themes or common aspects that you have seen over the course of your career when it comes to abductions of senior citizens?

WACKROW: Yes. Well, anytime you're talking about any type of abduction, really what investigators are doing is they're really working back from the opportunity and really who had access to Ms. Guthrie during that time frame? Who knew that she would be there, that she would be alone? And who might know that she is vulnerable? And that's why this is such a multi-track investigation that is taking place.

And really, you know, we haven't seen a ransom note, right? So, that's -- that is really important. But not all abductions are financially focused. Some, in this case with seniors, it could be personally motivated, driven by either a fixation or a grievance. It could also center around, you know, caretaker trust based abuse. We just don't know what the status of her engagement with others and those that she depended upon was at the time. And that's what investigators are really looking at. And then, you know, the final point here, Kate, is, this could have been just an opportunistic crime that escalated and got out of control that led to, you know, some sort of abduction.

Again, the bottom line here is that time is essential. We know we have a senior that is dependent upon, you know, medicine for, you know, her survival really. And as we now eclipsed the 48-hour mark, you know, investigators are, you know, really looking at every option that is available to them to, you know, one, find the suspect, and, more importantly, find Ms. Guthrie.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. And reinforcing also finding Ms. Guthrie, finding the suspect. And in trying to get to that point, they're asking for the public's help. Anything that could have been seen. Anything that could be known. Every tip to go to the Pima County Sheriff's tip line, which we're putting up there one more time for everyone to see.

Jonathan, thank you so much.

Sara.

SIDNER: All right, thank you, Kate.

Ahead of this year's critical midterms, President Trump is calling for something unprecedented and potentially unconstitutional. He's telling Republicans they should nationalize elections, suggesting the federal government take them over in more than a dozen states. At the heart of this are his ongoing, baseless claims that he won the 2020 election.

Listen to what he told podcaster, and former FBI deputy director, Dan Bongino.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The Republicans should say, we want to take over -- we should take over the voting -- the voting in at least many, 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: The Constitution stands in his way because it explicitly grants the states, not the federal government, the right to run their polls. Through Congress -- Congress is the only one allowed to alter those regulations. And this comes after the FBI searched an election office in Fulton County, Georgia, last week and seized the 2020 ballots.

[09:10:06]

CNN's Alayna Treene is live at the White House.

Why is the president calling for this, other than his stated belief, that is wrong, that he won the 2020 election?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, there's a couple reasons, but I'd argue probably the, you know, the biggest one, the biggest primary reason for the president to be saying this, particularly at this time, is because the midterm elections are around the corner. And I can tell you, the president and his team have been talking about the elections at length. And it's been giving the president, you know, more of a mind to continue to try and kind of rail against what he believes is not a fair election process. I mean we've heard him repeatedly, I know behind closed doors he continues to often claim, Sara, that the 2020 election was stolen. Of course, that's not true. But he does have a deep distrust of the integrity of the United States elections process. And more and more particularly as we're getting closer to the midterm elections, he's continued to try and sew that distrust among the American people.

Now, I do want you to listen to what we heard from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who made the point, you know, the fact, really, that this would be going against the Constitution if the president were actually to get his way with this.

Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): Does Donald Trump need a copy of the Constitution? What he's saying is outlandishly illegal. Once again, the president's talking no differently than a dictator who wants elections in America to be as legitimate as elections in countries like Venezuela.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TREENE: Now, part of the reason I think so many people are taking what the president said so seriously, even though I will say, of course, that it's very unlikely that this would happen. It would need to be a change in the Constitution for there to be nationalized elections. That's not really something the president can do himself.

But we have seen this administration, particularly during the president's second term, Sara, take different steps to really try and put a lot of pressure and take more control of the election process in the United States. One you mentioned was, of course, what we saw the FBI do when they raided the Fulton County, Georgia, voting center last week to grab some of those files. Tulsi Gabbard was on the ground there where she made that call to President Trump. But we've also seen other moves. We've seen the Justice Department

demand several states, including Minnesota, to turn over their full voter rolls. We also saw the president last year sign an executive order that would have required documentary proof of citizenship for voting and also demanding that mail ballots be received by the time of elections. All to say, we are likely to continue hearing this type of rhetoric in the lead up to the midterm elections, as the president continues to try and really put his imprint on the United States election system at a time when a lot of Republicans are worried about their chances come November.

SIDNER: Yes. It is just shocking. There's just no other word to use.

Alayna Treene, thank you so much.

John.

BERMAN: All right, with us now, CNN political analyst, White House correspondent for "The New York Times," Zolan Kanno-Youngs.

Zolan, great to see you this morning.

Just picking up on Alayna's last point there. Any one of these actions or statements by the president on elections, they're no one off at this point.

ZOLAN KANNO-YOUNGS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: No. No. And these comments, yes, Alayna was right in that there's a break here from the Constitution. And it is a comment into a podcast. But you almost -- you can't ignore it. You need to view it through the larger context of the actions that the president has been taking, and this administration has been taking, to really mobilize the government into his 2020 grievances, right? To really try to exert more control over the election system. You've had an administration that has demanded more voter data from states, including Minnesota. You had the president also issue an executive order last year to ramp up requirements for voting as well. That's going through the courts right now and has been met with legal challenges.

And then, of course, the Fulton County search, right, where you have this extraordinary appearance as well by Tulsi Gabbard, who, as the top intelligence official, you would think her job is more so to be worried about issues overseas. And now she's -- makes this appearance in Georgia. My colleagues also reporting that the president, at one point, was put on speakerphone to actually talk to some of the FBI agents on the ground there. Just an extraordinary moment that that would undermine this -- the independence you would think of this probe. What's supposed to be an independent probe. And here you have the president directly involved in it as well.

That's where, when you look at the actions throughout the past year to exert more control over the election system, you have to look at these comments through that prism.

[09:15:02] BERMAN: And one other line that Alayna had there that I want to pick up on. She said that Republicans -- elected Republicans she's talking to are uncomfortable, a little bit, with this heading into the midterms. Well, not so uncomfortable that they won't basically buckle to President Trump on almost everything, including now, you know, calls to fund the government, or at least Homeland Security, for another ten days, fend off this partial shutdown. What does that tell us about the power he still holds almost no matter what?

KANNO-YOUNGS: He still has a grip on the party. President Trump still has a tight grip on Republicans in Congress and really the party throughout the country. We've seen fissures, right? We've seen some cracks over the past year, particularly on his state -- his campaign promise to the working class, his populist message, Epstein files as well, his focus on foreign policy compared to domestic policy. But he's still got a grip on the party. You saw that over the past 48 hours with him getting some of the holdout Republicans on this funding bill to get in line. You know, that's still not signed yet, but it looks like it's going to pass.

At the same time, this now kicks the can down the road talking about Congress and this funding package, right? Yes, it looks like we're going to have a funding package for most of the government. But like the most polarizing, divisive issue possibly in Washington, that being DHS funding, that's now, I mean, they're still going to have to meet and come to some sort of consensus over that. And consensus doesn't seem -- that's a rarity when it comes to immigration, let alone the immigration agency.

BERMAN: I was looking at brand new comments from House Speaker Mike Johnson just a few minutes ago. I think basically baked into the cake is the idea that they may not be able to get the homeland security funding through in ten days.

KANNO-YOUNGS: Right.

BERMAN: They're bracing for the possibility it will be more or less unfunded.

Just very quickly, you know, we're a month into the year now. You know, many weeks after the Susie Wiles profile in "Vanity Fair." Several weeks after your Oval Office interview. All these discussions, you know, the president's going to refocus on the economy. Well, look at the headlines the last, you know, week and a half. You know, Greenland, arresting Don Lemon, the election raid in Georgia. None of those are the economy, Zolan.

KANNO-YOUNGS: No. No, they're not. And, you know, voters across the country, the president's own supporters made it clear that a majority of them voted for him for -- in order to turn the tide with the economy and for any type of economic policies. But here you have seen actions that seem more in line with retribution, right, and sort of the more political lens that the president has been looking through. But that issue of economy is not going to go away for his supporters.

I think about during our interview, when we asked him about those $2,000 checks that he would get from money generated from tariffs, and he almost seemed surprised that we were asking and said, I'm paraphrasing, but, oh, I did that when? He was almost caught off guard. Well, Americans are looking for details on that, particularly his supporters and some of those economic promises. And these actions that we're seeing, Fulton County, you know, Minneapolis, it doesn't address that issue of that economic anxiety.

BERMAN: Kennedy Center in Washington, just one more.

Zolan Kanno-Youngs, great to see you this morning. Thank you so much.

KANNO-YOUNGS: You're welcome.

BERMAN: Kate.

BOLDUAN: Change is coming on the ground in Minneapolis after those two deadly shootings. The DHS secretary now says all Homeland Security officers on the ground are getting body cameras.

And one big move and, poof, Elon Musk is now making one of the most valuable private companies in the world. Space (ph) meet Elon Musk's A.I. The details ahead.

And a truck sinking into a frozen pond and the driver stranded on top. Just take a look at that. How did this happen and what happened when they were rescued?

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[09:23:21]

BERMAN: All right, this morning, Elon Musk merging two of his companies, SpaceX and xAI. Together they will form what some are describing as the most valuable private company in the world.

CNN's A.I. correspondent, Hadas Gold, is here.

And this really is about pumping some money toward A.I., isn't it?

HADAS GOLD, CNN A.I. CORRESPONDENT: This is about pumping some money into xAI that needs cash right now. It's burning through a lot of cash. But this is all about funding Elon Musk's grandiose visions of the future, which is getting us to Mars. And the way that he plans for us to get there, part of the way, is A.I. data centers on Mars.

So, he wrote a memo to staff of SpaceX and xAI saying, "this marks not just the next chapter, but the next book in SpaceX and xAI's mission, scaling to make a sentient sun to understand the universe and extend the light of consciousness to the stars."

So, when you're talking about A.I. data centers, there's a lot of talk about putting A.I. data centers in space. Now, why is that? That's because data centers, as we know them right now on earth, at least for now, they take up a lot of space, they take up a lot of energy, and they need to stay cool. What does space have? A lot of space. It has -- it's very cold up there and it has endless energy in the form of the sun. There's no clouds up there in space. And so Elon Musk talks about this. He says, "the current advances are dependent on large terrestrial data centers. They require immense amounts of power and cooling. This is the only logical solution then is to transport these resource intensive efforts to a location with vast power and space."

Musk went on to say that he thinks that within the next two to three years the lowest cost way to generate A.I. compute will be in space.

Now, timelines are always sort of an issue with Elon Musk. He's promised a lot of things that would happen in a certain amount of time that have not actually happened, including sending a ship to Mars. He said that was going to happen in 2018. It's 2026. That hasn't happened yet.

[09:25:00]

But SpaceX is already working towards this. On Friday they actually requested from the FCC permission to launch one million satellites into space to start forming these orbital space data centers. And to be clear, Elon Musk is not the only one talking about this. Sam Altman, OpenAI, they are also talking about this and working on this. They see this as really essential to be able to fund -- or to be able to power A.I. data centers.

This is also a lot about cash. XAI wants to compete against the big labs. They are burning through cash. They need this cash right now. SpaceX is reportedly about to do a big public offering, a big IPO, set to raise around $50 billion. So, that cash is very sorely needed by xAI right now.

BERMAN: Wow. I mean that's a lot all at once there and a lot of assumptions and a lot of dreams really from Elon Musk. All I got to say is, people should go watch "Total Recall." Sometimes all these ideas about Mars don't work out exactly the way they plan.

GOLD: But you would be great on Mars, John.

BERMAN: I appreciate that. I appreciate -- Mars bureau chief, or chief Mars correspondent, if I can work that out.

Thank you very much, Hadas.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: So, effective immediately, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem says that Homeland Security officers in Minnesota are getting body cameras. The announcement follows the continued clashes between agents on the ground and protesters and the two deadly encounters when agents shot and killed Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

Let's get over to CNN's Whitney Wild, who's tracking this one for us.

Whitney, what are you learning about this new directive from the DHS secretary?

WHITNEY WILD, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRESPONDENT: Well, it is all encompassing. I think it's worth noting, Kate, that there were a handful of agents who were wearing body cameras already in Minnesota. In fact, sources have told CNN that investigators looking into the Alex Pretti shooting have up to 30 body worn cameras that were worn by agents engaged in that incident and agents who were working around that area at that time. So again, this is a scaling up of something that was already in place, just on a lower scale here.

Here's what DHS Secretary Noem said in her announcement. "Effective immediately, we are deploying body cameras to every officer in the field in Minneapolis. As funding is available, the body camera program will be expanded nationwide. We will rapidly acquire and deploy body cameras to DHS law enforcement across the country."

President Trump weighed in on this decision. Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, it wasn't my decision. I would have, you know, I leave it to her. They generally tend to be good for law enforcement because people can't lie about what's happening. So, it's, generally speaking, I think 80 percent good for law enforcement. But if she wants to do that, I'm OK with it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILD: Kate, more news out of Minnesota. A federal judge has wiped away a temporary restraining order which sought to basically hold in place evidence that had been collected by federal officials as they were investigating the Alex Pretti shooting. Just to remind our viewers of the context here, after the Alex Pretti shooting, federal law enforcement took complete control of that scene and did not allow the chief criminal agency, the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension in Minnesota, to access that scene, even though they normally access such scenes and they had a signed warrant by a state judge. So, at the time, those local officials had sued to try to get some of that evidence preserved. A judge had immediately, you know, allowed that to go through. And then yesterday dissolved that restraining order, saying simply that he believed federal officials were acting in good faith and that the evidence will be preserved pursuant to the standard laws and policies that are on the books.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: Whitney, thank you so much for the update on that. Really appreciate it.

Sara.

SIDNER: Well, coming up, President Trump says it's time for the DOJ to move on after its latest and final drop of Epstein files, as the deputy attorney general admits mistakes were made in the new release and not all of the files, as had been demanded by Congress, are being released. You'll hear from victims, coming up.

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