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Iran Declares Strait Of Hormuz Completely Open During Truce; Trump Says Port Blockade Will Remain Until Deal To End War Is A Hundred Percent Complete; Tomato Prices Rise By Double Digits Amid War, Weather And Tariffs; Singer D4vd Arrested On Suspicion Of Killing Teen Girl. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired April 17, 2026 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:00]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Telling Axios that he expects a deal to end the Iran War in a day or two. That comment follows a major breakthrough he announced earlier today, when Iran said it was reopening the Strait of Hormuz, though a number of details on that end remain unclear. President Trump says the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports will stay in place until the transaction with Iran is a hundred percent complete.

CNN has confirmed the Trump administration may release $20 billion in frozen Iranian assets as part of a deal it is discussing with Iran. That detail also first reported by Axios and its Global Affairs Correspondent, Barak Ravid, who joins us now.

Barak, thank you so much for being with us. Walk us through what you've learned about this potential unfreezing of $20 billion in assets because, at least publicly, President Trump is saying that no money is going to be exchanged.

BARAK RAVID, CNN POLITICAL & GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Yes, well, so I think since this negotiation started, it was very clear, especially in the round of talks in Pakistan last weekend, that the Iranians need money. They need it badly. Their economy is shattered.

It's even in a worse situation after the war and after this blockade that basically prevents them from exporting oil. So they need money urgently. They have -- the Iranians have $27 billion of their own money in frozen bank accounts in Qatar, in Iraq, in South Korea, in other countries around the world.

During the negotiations, at the beginning, the U.S. said we are willing to allow Iran to have access to $6 billion in a bank account in Qatar. In return, the U.S. wanted to get Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium. During the negotiations, the positions have changed and a new proposal was put on the table that talks about Iran accessing $20 billion in frozen funds, again of its own money, in return for giving most of its enriched uranium stockpile, shipping it out of the country, and down blending some of it inside Iran.

Those are the discussions according to two U.S. officials and two other sources. Marc Caputo, my colleague from Axios, and I spoke to. Now, it doesn't mean that this will be the final deal.

SANCHEZ: Right.

RAVID: There are still gaps. This is still under discussion. But when President Trump says no money is going to exchange hands, he's right. Because the money is in Iranian bank -- it's Iranian money in bank accounts that are frozen, and all that's going to happen is that the U.S. Department of Treasury will give waivers that will allow the Iranians to access those accounts.

SANCHEZ: It's notable though because President Trump of his predecessors, who unfroze Iranian assets, suggested that they were giving them money. So it's an interesting game of semantics that the White House seems to be playing.

I'm also curious, Barak, about what you described as the plan for the enriched uranium that is believed to be buried hundreds of feet under Iranian soil. There seemed to be some disagreement about whether that would be handed over to the U.S., a third country, or whether it would be, as you said, down blended in Iran.

Do you know how close they are on agreeing to a plan for that enriched uranium?

RAVID: I think this is one of the main sticking points that will have to be solved in the next few days. I think it's -- as far as from what I hear, it's going to be a mix. Some of it will be shipped out, I don't know, to the U.S. or to another country. Some of it will be down blended inside Iran. That's according to the information I got yesterday. But these negotiations are very dynamic, things change all the time.

But I think it is clear that the Iranians and the U.S. are both ready for a trade-off, for a deal of money -- unfreezing money in return for giving up on enriched uranium. The question is, now, how much money exactly and how exactly you remove this enriched uranium stockpile.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. The details on the opening of the Strait of Hormuz also still have to be worked out, because despite claims that it's completely open, the foreign minister of Iran specified that it would be only open on the coordinated route, which they've been charging a toll for passage through. Internally, state media in Iran has called for more clarity on this and has called for more control of the Strait, insinuating that they want to see some profit for traffic through the Strait.

How do we square that with what President Trump has said, which is that Tehran will never again use the Strait as a weapon?

RAVID: That's a good question. I have to say that until now, I did not get full clarity about how they're going to solve the issue of the Strait of Hormuz. I think this is -- at least from what I know, this is still an open issue. I think, by the way, President Trump's decision to impose a naval blockade on Iran, I think got the Iranians to move quite a bit on this thing.

[13:35:00]

I think this was actually a very good move that, actually a lot of people in the Trump administration wanted to do it long before because they thought it would be very effective and I think it has been proven that it's been very effective.

SANCHEZ: When President Trump says this will happen in a day or two, is he leaving room open, in your analysis, for a potential extension of the ceasefire if it does not or should we expect, if there is no deal within a day or two by the start of next week, that there will be kinetic action against Iran once more?

RAVID: You know, everything can happen.

SANCHEZ: Yeah.

RAVID: I don't think we can predict anything during this war, but the parties are discussing a three-page memorandum of understanding. This is not the full deal. This is sort of like a framework agreement, the principles that will guide the negotiation, the detailed negotiations among experts between both sides on a detailed comprehensive deal.

But without getting this memorandum of understanding, without having this framework, you can't get a deal. This is why this is such an important moment now, because this basically shows where the goalposts are. And as far as I hear from -- I heard it from two U.S. officials just around two hours ago, the parties are close to getting this memorandum of understanding, this framework agreement.

It could happen this weekend. And I think that when Trump says that it could happen this weekend, I think he's not exaggerating, again, when it comes to the framework agreement.

SANCHEZ: Yeah.

RAVID: A detailed agreement, you will need several months to get it done.

SANCHEZ: Barak Ravid, thank you so much for sharing your reporting with us.

RAVID: Thank you.

SANCHEZ: Let's get some perspective on these developments with CNN Global Affairs Analyst, Brett McGurk. He's a former Middle East and North Africa Coordinator at the National Security Council. Brett, thanks for being with us. How do you read all these developments?

BRETT MCGURK, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: I don't know exactly what's going on. I've talked to some people who should know what's going on, and they don't know exactly what's going on.

(LAUGH)

MCGURK: So I hope somebody knows what's going on. I think, I mean, even if, say we were negotiating and I'm a U.S. official and you're the Iranian team and we agree on what's on a paper, even then you would probably take it back to Tehran. The Revolutionary Guards look at it. It's a very complicated process in any case with Iran.

Here you have intermediaries. You have the Pakistani defense chief, the most powerful guy in Pakistan in Tehran. He's been there like three days. He's obviously in communication with the White House as he's talking to the Iranians. That's important, but it still means there's a bit of a game of telephone perhaps.

Clearly there's some diplomatic progress here, but I think as you said, Boris, details. We still don't know the details. This is all being done in public, with Truth social posts, and then the Iranians are saying things differently. So we'll see. But let's kind of, like, big picture, right now, there's a ceasefire across the Middle East. Nobody is shooting. That's good.

Clearly the Iranians are under some pressure. There's diplomacy going on, and let's hope that we can get somewhere here. But I agree with Barak. At best, this would be like a framework deal. You're not going to have the full comprehensive, particularly on nuclear, you have to have inspections. You have to have verification mechanisms. That's going to take some time to put together.

But we're coming up on the Tuesday deadline for the ceasefire, and it seems now there's enough diplomacy to hopefully get something in place that can allow that ceasefire to be extended.

JESSICA DEAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": And the president has declared the Strait of Hormuz situation over. Those are his words.

MCGURK: Yeah.

DEAN: At various points, when I talked to you, I don't know, a week or two ago, when the Iranians had effectively just shut it down, the blockade wasn't in place yet, it seemed like the Iranians had found new power, right? Like they had this new thing they could use. Now it seems like the balance of power has shifted again. How would you evaluate the blockade?

MCGURK: Little bit. I think the blockade we put on basically telling the Iranians, you know, they showed up in Islamabad last weekend, and they said, we have a gun on the table, we control the Straits of Hormuz, our ships will go out, and the ships we approve will go out.

And the Americans said, actually, we're going to put a bigger gun on the table, your ships will not go out, and we're going to try to get ships that we -- through the international Strait will come. What's happened since then, really no ships are getting out. And just mixed messaging today.

We've seen a statement from Abbas Araghchi, the foreign minister, who suggests any ship can now go through at least that Iranian passageway. But then Iranian state media, which I think is the Revolutionary Guards, the kind of power centers in Iran are saying, actually, no, wait a minute, we have not agreed to that. So we'll see. The thing about the ship traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, it's actually empirical. We can measure it, are ships going through or not. So if I'm back here tomorrow, we might know a little bit more.

DEAN: Yeah.

(LAUGH)

[13:40:00]

SANCHEZ: Maybe. The IRGC Navy just laid out some conditions for crossing the Strait as you were speaking. They're basically arguing that all transit requires its permission, and that only civilian vessels are allowed to pass through Iran's designated route, again which they've been charging people for. So you talked about putting a gun on the table and the sort of stick aspect of the conversation. I'm curious about the carrot aspect.

MCGURK: Yeah.

SANCHEZ: Because assets have been unfrozen before --

MCGURK: Yeah.

SANCHEZ: -- by multiple administrations. There has been financial incentive for Tehran to not only enter deals but to stay within them and to play nice with its neighbors. Why should the administration have confidence that now, this potential $20 billion unfreezing of assets would get Tehran to change some of its behavior, some of its motivations?

MCGURK: Well, first, it's a great question. As a former point person on this issue, I'm very familiar with these pots of money that are around. They can be part of a negotiation but I would recommend, we have the key to that through treasury regulations. These are -- $20 billion if I had to add, it is about $6 billion in Qatar and there's about up to a total, so a total $20 billion if you add what's in Iraq.

Because what happens is Iraq purchases Iranian gas to fuel its own energy grid but then the money is under our sanction. So it goes into an account that's Iran's money but it's locked down until we say you can use it for certain forms of trade. That's what we're talking about here.

So I think it's good to put that on the table because we can meter it out, we control it. But until we actually see steps from Iran, I don't think we would actually give that carrot. So you hold the carrot. Look if they're ready to get that entire stockpile, 440 kilograms of highly enriched uranium out of their country, then you can kind of see a bargain here.

But we have to see, you have to verify and trust but verify, see that it's happening and then we can work through treasury to loosen up some of those funds. But again, I think we're not there yet. The framework might be coming together, but I would not expect to see any assets released here anytime soon. DEAN: All right, much more to come on this. Brett McGurk, good to see you. Thank you so much.

And still ahead here, Stew Leonard is standing by on what all of this means for the cost of food and those tomatoes, when we come back.

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[13:46:55]

SANCHEZ: Right now, tomato lovers are learning just how expensive their tastes are becoming. The cost of the fruit or vegetable --

DEAN: Debatable.

SANCHEZ: -- apparently a controversy.

DEAN: It has seeds. I don't know.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. The government lists it as a vegetable, but the cost of it, nevertheless, has skyrocketed because of a combination of circumstances, the weather, war, and more. A deep freeze during Florida's peak tomato season. Also, a very wet growing season in Mexico have shrunk the crop size this year.

DEAN: OK, there's also a 17 percent tariff on tomatoes from Mexico, so add that in. Plus, rising fuel costs from weeks of Iran blocking the Strait of Hormuz, and rising fertilizer costs. Government data shows tomato prices were up about 15 percent last month. They're up 23 percent compared to the same time last year. We turn now to Stew Leonard for more. He's the President and Founder of the Stew Leonard's Grocery Stores in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut.

Stew, thanks for being here with us. I think you've got some -- a whole nice spread of tomatoes there below you that we saw earlier. But tell us, what are you seeing? Have they really gotten more expensive in your stores, too?

STEW LEONARD JR., PRESIDENT & FOUNDER, STEW LEONARD'S GROCERY STORES: Oh, yeah. Tomatoes have jumped up quite a bit. And I talked to one of our farmers this morning down in Florida, and it's just like, I mean, they had a real freeze going on down there. I mean, it was tough, and it damaged the tomato crop and delayed everything.

So you still have the demand, but the supply is just not there. So I think that'll recover. It's a blip. They feel that by Mother's Day, prices will be back down in line again. But you know what it's like? Tomatoes are up, right? Tomatoes are up this year, but now, you know what's down? Eggs are like half the price as they were last year. So, you know, there's some things that happen in the market in food.

Some of them have to do with supply and demand. And other ones just have to do with the cost of our farmers running their farms, like to put gas in the tractors and diesel fuel in the tractors. It costs them more right now. And fuel touches their harvesters that they have to go out in the field for. So there's two parts to inflation. One of them has to do with supply and demand. And the other one has to do with actual costs that have gone up on their farm. Like labor, for instance. We're never going to --

SANCHEZ: Yeah.

LEONARD: -- unwind the labor costs right now and say that people are going to make less than you did last year. You've got to keep raising your rates all the time.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. Stew, how have you seen some of your customers adjust? Have folks started buying more canned tomatoes?

LEONARD: That's a good point. First of all, the way we feel, people are up to here with food prices right now. I can sympathize with you. I mean, here's a good example. You have a beautiful cut of meat right here. But herd sizes are at a 50-year low. This will cost you up into the mid-teens as far as price per pound.

But there's good news. You can go to this, and we're seeing customers switch down to chicken breast. OK?

[13:50:00]

They're buying chicken breast. And one of my favorites, what I'm doing now is instead of a big steak, I'm cooking a pork chop. And these are great pork chops that we're getting from a local farm down in Pennsylvania.

So there's options right there. You don't have to spend, go up into the double digits for price per pound for your protein. You can get something around $4 or $5, whether you go to chicken or pork.

DEAN: Yeah, those are smart swaps for the time being. And I know a few weeks ago, you were talking about trying to split fuel costs with your suppliers, trying obviously to avoid passing on some of these extra fuel and tariff costs to your customers. What's the current state of that?

LEONARD: Well, you know what, we're dealing with a lot of local small businesses, right? So you don't want to put the squeeze on them too much. So -- but we do feel this is a temporary thing. We think fuel prices are going to be coming down after they get done figuring out what's happening with the Strait of Hormuz over there in the Middle East. So we're hopeful.

Our family that we're doing right now, we're just saying, let's hold on. We're not raising prices. Obviously, I got to bump the price a little bit for tomatoes. But as far as basic milk, butter, eggs, your basic would stay in the same price and our margins are thin already. We're going to have to eat a little bit of it right now.

But I think this is going to work itself out. And at least by Mother's Day, I think you're going to see food prices have some relief to them.

DEAN: All right. Well, let's hope that is the case. Stew, it is great to see you. Thank you so much. We appreciate it.

LEONARD: OK. You bet you. You have a nice day. Thank you.

DEAN: Thanks. You too. Have a good weekend.

Still ahead, authorities have arrested singer D4vd on suspicion of killing a 14-year-old girl whose decomposed body was found in his Tesla. We have more details on that arrest ahead.

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[13:57:00]

DEAN: New video obtained by the California Post showing Los Angeles police arresting the singer known as D4vd. He was taken into custody on suspicion of killing a 14-year-old girl. Investigators discovered the dismembered and decomposing body of Celeste Rivas Hernandez in the trunk of the singer's apparently abandoned Tesla back in September. Her family reported her missing in 2024.

So let's bring in CNN's Josh Campbell who's been following this case. Josh, what more are you learning?

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Well, this is a significant development in that ongoing investigation into the death of 14-year- old Celeste Rivas Hernandez last year. I want to warn our viewers that the details of her discovery are extremely disturbing.

The Los Angeles Police Department says its tactical teams from the Robbery Homicide Division as well as U.S. Marshals arrested the popular singer, David Burke, for her murder yesterday, arrested on suspicion of murder. Now, her decomposed body was found last year, as you mentioned, in an abandoned Tesla that was towed from a location in the Hollywood Hills here in Los Angeles.

That vehicle was registered to the singer. As the AP reported, investigators searching that Tesla in a tow yard found a cadaver bag. They unzipped it. They discovered a decomposed head as well as a torso. According to court documents, the L.A. County Medical Examiner determined that her arms and her legs had been severed. A second bag was found in the vehicle containing other dismembered parts.

The cause of death has not yet been publicly announced. Now, David Burke's defense team, they are vehemently denying that their client is involved here. I'll read you their statement.

They say, let us be clear the actual evidence in this case will show that David Burke did not murder Celeste Rivas Hernandez and he was not the cause of her death. Their statement goes on to say that there has been no indictment returned by any grand jury in this case and no criminal complaint has been filed. They say D4vd has been detained under suspicion. We will vigorously defend D4vd's innocence.

Now, as AP notes, authorities had not publicly named Burke as a suspect prior to yesterday's arrest, but he had been under investigation by a grand jury that was looking into Rivas Hernandez's death. As far as what happens next, he will remain in police custody for the time being without bail. Authorities say they will present the case to the L.A. County District Attorney's Office on Monday, Jessica.

DEAN: And on that note, Josh, what kind of evidence are the prosecutors going to need to build a case like this?

CAMPBELL: Yeah, if this actually goes to a murder charge, it would depend on the degree of murder that is actually charged. But we're typically talking about prosecutors having to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that someone intended to cause the death of another, perhaps that the death was caused during the commission of some type of other violent crime.

As far as the evidence they're looking at, they would conduct things like witness interviews. We can imagine, they would also be looking at DNA that was recovered potentially from the scene there, again, to try to determine, try to place Burke with the remains.

And then, of course, they would have to make the case that he actually killed her, not that she just died and he tried to dispose of her body. But there was a high hurdle here for prosecutors. Of course, we're waiting to see whether this actually goes to prosecution.