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Savannah Guthrie Makes Emotional Plea for Mother's Safe Return; Trump Says Fatal Minneapolis Shootings Should Not Have Happened; Fresh New Faces at Quarterback for Super Bowl LX. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired February 05, 2026 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: A desperate search and a tearful plea for Nancy Guthrie's safe return. Savannah Guthrie and her siblings take to social media to try to reach her abductors and send a message to their 84-year-old missing mother.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, a softer touch on the immigration crackdown, the president's new claim on what he wants to see on the ground. We've got new reporting on what's actually happening.

And then the hottest act of the Winter Olympics is not an athlete or a sport, but a dancing robot. Why you might be seeing it much more than you ever wanted?

Kate is out today. I'm John Berman with Sara Sidner. This is CNN News Central.

SIDNER: Breaking overnight, Today Show Host Savannah Guthrie, her sister and her brother make an emotional plea for the safe return of their mother. We are entering the fifth day since 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie was abducted from her home outside Tucson, Arizona.

Overnight, Savannah Guthrie and her siblings took to social media to speak directly to their mother and to whomever took her. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SAVANNAH GUTHRIE, TODAY HOST: On behalf of our family, we want to thank all of you for the prayers for our beloved mom, Nancy. We feel them and we continue to believe that she feels them too. Our mom is a kind, faithful, loyal, fiercely loving woman of goodness and light.

She's funny, spunky and clever. She has grandchildren that adore her and crowd around her and cover her with kisses. She loves fun and adventure. She's a devoted friend. She is full of kindness and knowledge. Talk to her and you'll see.

Our mom is our heart and our home. She's 84 years old. Her health, her heart is fragile. She lives in constant pain. She's without any medicine. She needs it to survive. She needs it not to suffer.

We too have heard the reports about a ransom letter in the media. As a family, we are doing everything that we can. We are ready to talk. However, we live in a world where voices and images are easily manipulated. We need to know without a doubt that she's alive. And that you have her. We want to hear from you, and we are ready to listen. Please reach out to us.

Mommy, if you are hearing this, you are a strong woman. You are God's precious daughter, Nancy. We believe and know that even in this valley, he's with you. Everyone is looking for you, Mommy, everywhere. We will not rest. Your children will not rest until we are together again.

We speak to you every moment, and we pray without ceasing. And we rejoice in advance for the day that we hold you in our arms again. We love you, Mom.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Love you, Mom.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We love you, Mom. Stay strong.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We love you, Mom. We love you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SIDNER: That is just crushing to hear from the family as they hope that their mother is at least alive and can be brought back home.

One thing to note, you heard Savannah there acknowledging or seeming to acknowledge the ransom demands and asking the abductor for concrete proof of life, citing the possibility that A.I. can be used to fake their mother's voice.

[07:05:09]

John?

BERMAN: Oh, all right. I want to get right to CNN Senior National Security Analyst Julitte Kayyem. Juliette, I think all of us who watch that is just simply gutting. And I want to dissect some of the language used in just a second. But, first, when do you decide to make a video like that? What does the fact that they put that at tell you about this point in the investigation?

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, generally and probably with high confidence, they are in direct coordination with the FBI and local law enforcement. The family wouldn't have done this on their own. And you saw it was a highly, you know, constructed, written out with various themes to what she was saying, both the sort of, mom, we're here with you describing the mother so that the potential captors begin to understand her, maybe sympathize with her. And then the last part, which is, of course, the proof of life demand.

The horror of our times is this is -- you know, this is a horror for the family. And then you add on the potential for miss or disinformation, this rumor mill that any of us who are following the story certainly are watching. So, they are demanding some form of proof of life, which would be a voice, but also details about the abduction before they get into any discussions with the potential captors. We don't even know that yet.

BERMAN: No, we don't. Although, again, I think you absolutely 100 percent have to assume this was in direct coordination with investigators and very meticulously planned down and worded, for lack of a better word, the humanizing of Nancy Guthrie there. Why do you go to such great ends to point out what a loving, caring individual she is?

KAYYEM: Yes. Look, I mean, this does not happen a lot. Take Savannah Guthrie out of it. I mean, you have an elderly person, didn't seem to live beyond, you know, in crazy means. And we have sort of no progress, I have to say, after four or five days, at least that we know about publicly. So, this is where you begin to sort of try to talk directly, not just with the captors, where you try to sort of breed sympathy, understand who this person meant. She's not just a figure. She's not just someone's -- someone famous as mother if they even knew, but also they have -- the captors, assuming that's the dominant theory of this, have a network of people that may know. And so you talk or you humanize Nancy, you know? And that's what the family did.

That's what the -- and it wasn't just Savannah. I mean, you have her, you know, brother and sister behind, you know, just, you know, looking -- you know, they don't look like they're used to being in front of a camera, sort of saying, look, we are just a family. We're not anything special. We just love our mother.

BERMAN: And very quickly, the FBI is now much more directly involved. Director Kash Patel is headed down there. There were investigators researching the crime scene yesterday. What does that all that tell you?

KAYYEM: Well, I think the researching is unfortunately that they're going back to see if they missed anything. I saw that they were back at the house yesterday. There may be -- there's a press conference, I believe, today or soon in which they disclose more information. But four or five days is a long time with no person of interest, no pictures. You know, we have some data from the -- her heart machine, some sense of timing. And so it looks like that they're just bringing in more resources to see if they can find something out. It's just absolutely devastating for the family.

BERMAN: Absolutely. All right, Juliette, thank you so much for helping us understand what we saw. And everyone should know that there are numbers to call. They should let the FBI or local authorities know if they have any information here. This is the tip line right there. Take a good look on that and absolutely help if you have any information.

All right, swirling political speculation this morning. Is she running? Kamala H.Q., the campaign social media account for former Vice President Kamala Harris, re-launching this morning. Why?

And then huge explosions at a train station, new reporting this morning on what set it all off.

And, quote, it will be a little bit taller than the one in Paris, new details about the plans for the giant arch in Washington, D.C.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:10:00]

SIDNER: All right. In new remarks about the fatal shootings of Rene Good and Alex Pretti at the hands of federal agents in Minneapolis, President Trump is appearing to take a more nuanced approach. The president suggesting a softer touch may be needed, and acknowledging the shootings should not have happened.

CNN's Alayna Treene is at the White House. Alayna, what did the president have to say about what's been happening with his immigration reform, if you will?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yes. Look, I mean, President Trump is not one to typically admit when he or anyone really in his administration may have made certain mistakes or if there have been missteps in their approaches, particularly when it comes to an issue like immigration and his crackdown across the country, one that this White House still continues to leave is one of the most popular issues that he is running on. But he did adopt a very conciliatory tone when talking about this, telling NBC News in this interview that he believes perhaps a softer touch would have been better. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: I learned that maybe we can use a little bit of a softer touch, but you still have to be tough. These are criminals. We're dealing with really hard criminals.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[07:15:01]

TREENE: Now look, I will tell you just from behind the scenes, the conversations I've been having over in recent the last two weeks really ever since the shooting of Alex Pretti, the Trump administration has, you know, wavered on its messaging approach. At first, of course, we saw them be very aggressive in their defense of these ICE agents. The president continued to defend ICE in that interview, but we also saw the president particularly being the one to read the room here.

And I will say, I'm sure they're looking at this new polling, including new polling we saw come out from Quinnipiac that shows Americans across the country, including many Republicans, do not believe that the deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good by the hands of these ICE agents were justified. One of this Quinnipiac poll I'm referencing, it says, the majority of registered voters said that 62 to 22 said that it was not justified, the killing of Alex Pretti. That is a 40-point margin. When you look at independence, it goes even further than that, a 50-point margin. Now, all of this comes, as we also heard from the president's borders czar, Tom Homan, saying that they're now getting rid 700 -- they're sending 700 personnel on the ground in Minnesota home. They're going to keep 2,000 on the ground, but beginning to see a bit of that drawdown that we heard them kind of tease a week or so ago.

And so we have to see whether or not this will actually do much to escalate the situation on the ground in Minnesota, Sara, but, again, a rare moment of the president acknowledging when perhaps he and his team did not really take the right approach here.

SIDNER: Yes, after two Americans are dead. It is a stark difference in the way people feel on the ground in Minnesota. But hearing him have some contrition is interesting because we don't hear that often.

Alayna Treene, thank you so much.

Ahead for us, police say a scary discovery when they pull a guy over for a suspected DUI and found three children in his trunk.

Also, Sunday could be history in the making in the music industry. Today, we could learn a lot more about Bad Bunny's Super Bowl halftime show.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:20:00]

BERMAN: All right. Normally, I want every human on earth to be watching our show, CNN News Central, but there is one person I hope is not this morning, that's Drake Maye. I hope he is sleeping soundly, getting all the rest that he needs because Sunday, he's got a job to do. It is Super Bowl Sunday.

Let's get right to CNN's Coy Wire. The excitement is -- I mean, to say it's building is an understatement, Coy.

COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: It is. And he is sleeping. He's dreaming of the Lombardi for you, John. And this is a matchup of -- like a wild matchup of a quarterback, because Drake Maye's just in his second season. He's going to the Super Bowl before Josh Allen, before Lamar Jackson. He beat three top five defenses in the playoffs to make it to the Super Bowl, first quarterback to ever do that.

23 years old, he'll be the second youngest quarterback to ever start in a Super Bowl behind only Dan Marino. His teammates say he's an ultimate leader.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TREVEYON, HENDERSON, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS RUNNING BACK: He has done such a great job of just leading this offense, leading this team, and being a vocal leader, but most importantly, leading by example with the work that he puts in each and every day when he comes to practice. He's always looking to get better and push the guys around him to get better as well. KAYSHON BOUTTE, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS WIDE RECEIVER: And he is always there for us and it's good that a guy like that a quarterback. We -- everybody believe in him. We know we're going to find a way at the end of the day.

CRAIG WOODSON, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS SAFETY: Just the way he carries himself, just the way that he goes about his work and trying to get better every day, like, you know, that's something that you can just, you know, look at and be -- try to follow in his footsteps.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WIRE: Now, the Seahawks quarterback, Sam Darnold, has a wild journey. The Jets traded him, the Panthers let him walk, the 49ers had him as a backup. We won 14 games with the Vikings, but even they weren't convinced. Now, he's an NFC champ leading his fifth team to the Super Bowl, the epitome of persistence, perseverance, inspiring his teammates along the way.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER KUPP, SEATTLE SEAHAWKS WIDE RECEIVER: For Sam, being able to do what he did and go through the early trials that he did and be able to come back from that, it's impressive. It's really impressive. It takes a lot of mental fortitude to be able to push through those things. And to be here now and do what he's done the last couple years is -- it's -- there's not many people that have done it.

A.J. BARNER, SEATTLE SEAHAWKS TIGHT END: For any player in this league, like you go through ups and downs, you have successes and failures, and to know that a guy like Sam, you know, has weathered the storm and he's playing his best ball right now, I think it's encouraging as a player, a young, you know, to keep growing, keep learning, and the sky's the limit for any player that sticks to it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WIRE: Now, John, you have to hear this. Sam Darnold's grandfather has one of the wildest sports resumes ever, key player for the 54 USC men's basketball team, went to the Final Four, and then became an Olympian playing for Team USA Volleyball in 1964. He also went into acting, became a captain of a firefighting crew there, and he was also the cowboy hat-wearing, steely-eyed Marlboro man that you've probably seen in the old time. As his name, Richard Hammer.

So, there you go, John, or I don't know what that says about his chances, you know, his grandson playing against your Drake Maye in the Super Bowl, but we'll see how it all shapes out.

BERMAN: Yes. With all due respect, I hope it's not Hammer time. That's all I can say, you know? And I hope, you know, Sam Darnold's saying, you can't touch this.

You know, Coy Wire, great to see you this morning. Thanks so much for all of that.

WIRE: You too, brother.

BERMAN: All right, the breaking news, the new video from Savannah Guthrie and her siblings pleading for the safe return of their mother. New analysis of what each line means, what they're hoping to shake loose in this investigation.

A popular toy and a microwave sending kids to the hospital, a warning about a dangerous TikTok craze.

And is she running? Reading the social media cyber tea leaves, the question coursing through the political world with a major move from former Vice President Kamala Harris and her social media account.

[07:25:08]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SIDNER: The breaking news from overnight, Today Show Host Savannah Guthrie and her siblings making a heartfelt and tearful plea for their missing mother to be returned safely.

[07:30:02]

We're now entering day five of the search for 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie. Authorities believe she was abducted from her home outside Tucson.