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Gas Prices Jumped 7 Cents to $4.30; Elon Must to Wrap Testimony in Trial Against OpenAI; Incumbent Democratic Governor Janet Mills Drops Out of Senate Race in Maine; Timmy the Whale Now on Its Way to North Sea. Aired 9:30-10a ET

Aired April 30, 2026 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:30:00]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Gas prices have jumped 7 cents overnight to $4.30 a gallon on average. That's the biggest one day, one night, if you will, jump in the last six weeks. Keeping an eye on oil prices, they have been falling this morning after they did briefly spike and spike by quite a bit to over $126 a barrel.

The executive director of the International Energy Agency is now saying that the global economy has been catapulted into what they're describing as a major energy and economic crisis. CNN's David Goldman is here with much more on that. And you kind of want to say, no kidding.

DAVID GOLDMAN, CNN BUSINESS SENIOR REPORTER: Yes, right, exactly. I mean, we have seen gas prices go all the way back up to where they were just a few weeks ago and then some, right? So when we were talking just a week ago, we were at $4.03. Just yesterday, $4.23, $4.30 today. And I think what every driver is wondering is how much higher can they go? We thought we were over it, right? We thought this was well and done.

And the reason why it isn't is because oil has come all the way back, right? When we started talking about maybe this war is going to end, oil fell near $80. We are all the way back close to $126 this morning.

There were some technical reasons for that that aren't that interesting, but we're still in the triple digits. That's what we need to figure out.

BOLDUAN: Your self-awareness is remarkable.

GOLDMAN: Yes, look, I geeked out on this this morning. There was a whole fun discussion, but let's not worry about that.

BOLDUAN: As you should. Yes, cut to the chase for the rest of America.

GOLDMAN: $114 is really expensive, OK? So that's what's going into -- gas prices follow Brent. That's the international standard.

That's the thing that they're -- that's the input. And then when they make the gas, that's the first cost that they have to pay. BOLDUAN: At the same time, there's more information that impacts everyone that just came in this morning. John was talking about it earlier. GDP numbers, inflation data. Added up, what do you make of it?

GOLDMAN: Yes, well, I mean, so the number doesn't look that great. So we had 3.5 percent PCE inflation. What that real -- this is the number that the Fed looks at, right, when they're setting rates.

That's not great. They want it around 2 percent. It's not huge, but that's going in the wrong direction, certainly.

You can see it was 2.8 just a month ago. But here's the key number that I want to focus on, that it was -- there was a gain of 0.2 percent in spending when you take inflation out of the picture. That's pretty good.

[09:35:00]

Another number I want you to focus on is GDP. We just had this report, 2 percent. That's pretty good, too.

Now, the thing is, these are both backward-looking. We're looking at the first quarter. We're looking at March.

And that shows you what the economy was doing before the war started. It was pretty decent. And now we're dealing with those high gas prices, high oil prices.

And you have to worry about, is that going to hold up throughout the war? Probably not.

BOLDUAN: Yes, it's good to see you, David. Thank you so much.

GOLDMAN: Great to see you, too.

BOLDUAN: John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, a new day of testimony in the tech billionaire legal battle. I call it Tech Thunderdome. Elon Musk back on the stand in his suit against OpenAI.

He says they strayed from their original nonprofit mission. He's also saying a lot of other things. CNN's AI correspondent Hadas Gold at the trial in Oakland with the very latest.

Good morning to you.

HADAS GOLD, CNN AI CORRESPONDENT: Hey, John. We are entering in Musk's seventh hour of testimony, and this is a blockbuster trial against OpenAI that could completely change the future of the AI landscape and could potentially change the future for the ChatGPT maker OpenAI. Each side yesterday spent their time questioning Musk and trying to prove their side, whether he was deceived when he donated $38 million to OpenAI and then they turned their nonprofit to having a for-profit subsidiary. Or whether he always wanted OpenAI to go for profit in some way, but that he left when he couldn't control it anymore and that this lawsuit is just about him trying to bring down a competitor since he has his own AI company, XAI.

At one point yesterday, Elon Musk told the court, I was a fool. He says, "I needed to make sure that OpenAI would go in the right direction and I was providing almost all the money." He says, "I was a fool. I gave them free funding to create a startup."

Another piece of evidence that Elon Musk's lawyers introduced was a series of messages between him and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman in 2022.

After a Microsoft investment, OpenAI was valued at $20 billion and Musk told on what was going on here and Altman responds. I agree. This feels bad. Musk told the court that that interaction, he said it felt like a bait and switch.

But on OpenAI's cross-examination, which started yesterday, their attorneys went to Musk and said, Hey, here's some e-mails. Here's some meeting notes where you say that OpenAI should probably go for profit.

This is the only way they're going to get enough money to run all of that really expensive compute to be able to compete properly. They even showed meeting notes where he directed some of his executives to actually go and register a for-profit corporation. Musk told the court that in some cases he just didn't recall those conversations and in other times he says he wasn't opposed to a for-profit subsidiary as long it was a capped profit.

There were some fireworks in court. I don't think Elon Musk is used to being talked to in the way that an attorney might cross-examine a witness on the stand. There were some tense moments.

At one point, OpenAI's attorney was trying to ask Elon Musk just yes or no questions. And Elon Musk was saying, you can't answer these with yes or no questions. He said, your questions are not simple. They're designed to trick me. And then he made the classic fallacy of have you stopped beating your wife comparison? But the judge was not going to go there and she cut him off completely.

Today, Elon Musk is going to be back on the stand. We expect another two hours or so of cross-examination and redirect. He is definitely one of the star witnesses in this case.

This case is going to go on for another couple of weeks and we're expecting to hear some of the biggest names in tech, including Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and then OpenAI CEO Sam Altman will come up in the next coming weeks -- Guys.

BERMAN: All right, standby, a lot more to come. Hadas Gold in Oakland, thank you very much.

All right, question, how do you move a giant humpback whale to safety? The answer is very carefully and also just like this.

The World Cup kicks off in a few weeks. Who cares if you can't afford the tickets? You can as long as your dog can get some snazzy new kit. [09:40:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: All right, the breaking news just moments ago, a major shakeup in one of the most closely watched Senate races in the country. The incumbent Democratic Governor, Janet Mills, has dropped out of the Senate race there, leaving these two people, Democrat Grant Platner, to run against Republican incumbent Susan Collins, seen as one of the most vulnerable Republicans in the country.

So how did we get here? CNN Chief Data Analyst, Harry Enten, here with some breaking magic, right?

This is one of our first breaking magic walls here. You pulled this together in roughly 35 seconds.

HARRY ENTEN, CNN CHIEF DATA ANALYST: Yes.

BERMAN: OK, so Janet Mills, who's not on this picture right now --

ENTEN: No.

BERMAN: -- what did she see here, maybe?

ENTEN: What did she see? She saw that there was no way forward. I mean, just look at the primary polling.

I mean, look, she was getting blown out. Grant Platner was up 64 percent to 26 percent. Now, this is just one of the polls, but I could have shown you any slew of the polls.

The bottom line is this. Platner was absolutely crushing Mills, an incumbent governor. He basically came out of nowhere and has pretty much led wire to wire in this race.

It's quite a stunning political development.

BERMAN: She had the support of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. And part of this is being seen as a generational battle inside the Democratic Party.

ENTEN: Yes, absolutely right. I mean, you look at these numbers and you see an incumbent governor, a fairly well-liked incumbent governor, in fact, at least within the Democratic Party, trailing by nearly 40 points. You go, what the heck is going on out here?

Well, this is part of a larger trend. I think, you know, you take Maine and you sort of spread it out across the political map. How do Democrats feel?

Well, the bottom line is this. They say that their elected officials in D.C. that they're too old. I mean, look at this.

Eighty six percent say most D.C. elected officials are too old. I mean, that my goodness gracious. You talk about identify as liberal. [09:45:00]

Of course, Platner was running from the left. We're talking about an all time high here. Fifty nine percent.

You put all that together. Remember, Joe Biden had to drop out of the 2024 election. I think that that ghost was very much haunting Mills, who's 78 years old, in this race.

And you see that you combine that with a Democratic Party that is shifting to the left. And you put those two together and you had a perfect storm for Graham Platner, has acquired a lot of support in Maine and run a fairly good race.

BERMAN: OK, so now this is the race. Graham Platner against Susan Collins. What are the prediction markets saying the odds are?

ENTEN: Yes, OK. So I think a lot of Republicans who, you know, obviously there's been a lot of controversy surrounding Graham Platner, right? His tattoo, et cetera.

You look at this and you say, hey, this is a race I want to run. But take a look here. Who chance to win the Maine Senate race?

You look at the Kalshi prediction markets. Look at this. The Democrats -- Graham Platner has been gaining. He has been gaining. He's a 71 percent chance to win the Senate race over the incumbent Susan Collins, whose odds have been falling through the floor.

She was at 51 percent nine months ago, old enough to have a kid and now down to 29 percent. His odds up over 20 points. Her odds, Susan Collins' odds down 20 points.

BERMAN: OK, why?

ENTEN: Why? Why? Why? Why? Very simply put, Susan Collins, not popular, not popular at this point. Look at this. Look at this. Susan Collins, not popularity rating.

I mean, each pollster's last poll, a positive not popularity rating. No polls for Susan Collins. Negative all the polls as Platner has led in every nonpartisan poll in this race.

And I will also note that this is very much unlike 2020 when it was not the case that Susan Collins was this unpopular. It's a whole new world for Maine and a whole new world for Graham Platner. And now he's able to look ahead to the general election.

BERMAN: One of these all polls.

ENTEN: No polls.

BERMAN: Breaking magic, a first here on CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

ENTEN: I managed to put it all together. I don't know how it is with your moral support. BERMAN: Thank you very much. You sound like Pete Hegseth. Thank you very much. We got a lot of news this morning. We'll be right back.

[09:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: Now for some possibly very good news after weeks of failed rescue attempts. Timmy the whale, this young humpback whale who had been stranded off the coast of Germany in the Baltic Sea, is now on a barge and headed toward the open ocean. He's been stranded in shallow waters since March.

Hundreds of people have been involved in this rescue effort. Timmy now headed to the North Sea. It is, however, a very dangerous journey and not yet over.

CNN's Sebastian Shukla is joining us right now. This entire story, this whale, what has happened to it, how long it's been stranded and all of the efforts that have gone into trying to save it have just captivated people. What's the latest here?

SEBASTIAN SHUKLA, CNN FIELD PRODUCER: Yes, captivated is the word. It's the tale of this humpback whale or perhaps more accurately, Kate, the saga that has been Timmy's life as he's been coined by the locals there in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, this northern region of Germany where he's been stuck on multiple different locations, I hasten to add. The latest place he was stuck was not the first either.

And this mission that had been launched by these two millionaires to get him freed has been beset by issues. It's taken weeks. I was up there a couple of weekends ago when we thought that this would be the moment, he would finally move.

He was only really started this process on his journey back to where they hope will be the North Atlantic in recent days. And as you can see from the video of this audacious attempt to get him free, we're literally seeing him being dragged in this pen, this almost pontoon style, through the Baltic Sea up around the coast of Denmark and then through the North Sea and then hopefully will deposit him back into the wild, into the North Atlantic.

But obviously, Kate, it has captured the attention of definitely that region of Germany, if not the whole country more generally. There have been push notifications sent to people's mobile phones from local media outlets. There have been 24-hour live streams covering Timmy's every single waking moment. And any time he moved, any time he shot up the steam out of his blowhole there, any time he moved, it's been extraordinary, Kate.

And it really has captured the attention of so many people ultimately just want to see him freed. And hopefully, Kate, we are one step closer to -- dare I say it -- free Timmy.

BOLDUAN: And dare you did. By all accounts, how is the whale actually doing? Is he doing in terms of its health in this whole saga? SHUKLA: Yes, it's actually been quite difficult to determine exactly what the state of his health has been. The water level that he was stuck in was so shallow. And to give you an idea of it, it came up, people, the divers out there attending to him when I saw him were about waist high.

So they've been looking to try to keep his health in the best possible shape. There is a divergence of opinions whether he will be able to survive in the wild or whether he ultimately will just die.

[09:55:00]

But we won't know that, Kate, until the activists who are helping him finally release him back out there.

BOLDUAN: Quite a thing. Quite a moment to watch all of this. Sebastian, thanks so much. I really appreciate it -- John.

BERMAN: All right, we showed this to you earlier here, but it's pretty amazing. At a rescue near Fort Worth, Texas, police used jumper cables, and it's really good to look at. Police used jumper cables to save a mother and her three children from raging floodwaters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I need something to get wrapped around her so we can pull her. Hey, why isn't it coming? Give it.

Come on. I'm going to give you some cables. I'm going to wrap around you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So they looped the cables under the mother's arms. They kept her secured until crews were able to hook a chain around the car and drag it out of the water, getting everyone to safety.

And just in time for the World Cup, you may not be able to afford a ticket. Few can. But your dog will not have to suffer because of the high prices. Adidas has unveiled its New Jersey collection for pets inspired by the kits from Mexico, Colombia, Argentina, and the United States.

The collection will be available in stores and online starting tomorrow.

BOLDUAN: Those dogs seem to be loving it.

BERMAN: They're going to love it. Thank you all so much for joining us. This has been CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

BOLDUAN: "THE SITUATION ROOM" is up next.

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