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Trump Says Ceasefire Still in Effect as U.S., Iran Trade Fire; Hantavirus-Hit Cruise Ship Heading to Spain's Canary Islands; Cyberattack Hits School Platform During Finals Week. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired May 08, 2026 - 08:00   ET

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

COLLEEN KINDER, WRITER & LECTURER AT YALE SUMMER SESSION: I expected them to need more policing, whereas they were just so ready. They were all in. And what I noticed with my students this past summer, all seven of whom gave -- gave up their phones for a month is that they noticed by about the second or third week that they were sleeping. They were able to read for longer periods of time. They were able to sink into things in a way that -- that was so rare for them. And it was quite moving to me.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Yeah, I think this is all really fascinating because you get the -- and I really appreciate you coming on because you have this research coming out this week that said, you know, in K through 12 schools, the kind of lockdowns on phones didn't necessarily change test scores, if you will. But it's a different type of benefit that we're kind of talking about here. It's a life benefit. It's getting away from isolation. It's being able to lock in and think, if you will, that is a benefit that might be not seen in test scores, at least quite yet.

Colleen Kinder, it's great to meet you. I hope you're accepting applications for your course from women who are no longer in college because that would be really nice for me this summer.

Thank you so much for your time. Thank you.

A new hour of "CNN New Central" starts now.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: This morning, the White House is promising a full report on the deadly hantavirus, but experts say the CDC has not been involved like it has been in times past. What does that mean for this outbreak and future ones?

Plus, only on CNN, former inmates who shared a prison with Ghislaine Maswell are now speaking out. The perks and special treatment they say she got behind bars and what happened to them, four speaking out.

And we're standing by for the release of a brand-new jobs report this hour. What those numbers will reveal about the Iran war's impact on the U.S. labor market.

I'm Sara Sidner with Kate Bolduan and John Berman. This is "CNN New Central." BOLDUAN: A race is on this morning. Health officials are urgently trying to track and contain this rare strain of the hantavirus after that deadly outbreak aboard a cruise ship. At this hour, that ship is on its way to Spain's Canary Islands.

On board, still more than 140 people, including 17 Americans. We're told that no one on board are currently symptomatic, but -- symptomatic -- but the thing about this virus, of course, is that it can incubate for up to six weeks before showing symptoms.

There are also dozens of passengers who got off the ship late last month and have already returned home. Disease detectives across four different continents now are trying to track them down and the people that they've come in contact with. Here in the United States, there are five states that are currently monitoring at least six people.

Five hantavirus cases from the boat have been confirmed and three people have died from this. An American doctor is among those who's still stuck on the ship. He was on board on vacation and he told CNN that a team of epidemiologists and doctors are now on board to help.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. STEPHEN KORNFELD, CARED FOR SICK PASSENGERS ABOARD SHIP: So, now there's a great team on board who is really going through every aspect of this infection, how it's spread and what it means for the passengers remaining, both for their health and for their possible transmission down the road. So, I'm feeling pretty good that most people will get off the boat relatively soon and hopefully I will get off soon also.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Yes, for sure. President Trump says that the outbreak in his view is very much, we hope, under control is how he put it. He also says that a full report on it is coming today, not offering yet any further detail of what that could include.

John?

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, breaking overnight. The United Arab Emirates says they are dealing with incoming missiles at the hands of Iran. Saudi Arabia is calling for de-escalation across the region after the United States says Iran targeted three American guided missile destroyers as they transited the Strait of Hormuz. U.S. forces then hit a number of Iranian military facilities in response. President Trump says it is just a trifle and that the back and forth is just a love tap.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), U.S. PRESIDENT: They trifled with us today. We blew them away. They trifled. They call that a trifle. I'll let you know when there's no cease. You won't have to know. If there's no ceasefire, you're not going to have to know. You're just going to have to look at one big glow coming out of Iran. And they'd better sign their agreement fast.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: With us now is Congressman Pete Aguilar from California. He's the third-ranking Democrat in the House. And, Congressman, we did just get a bit of breaking news. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who's in Italy, says he expects a response from the Iranians today on whatever this current peace proposal is. Generally speaking, how much progress do you see?

REP. PETE AGUILAR (D-CA): You know, I think what the American people see is they see a war of choice. They see skyrocketing gas prices. They see a president who will go on TV and say whatever he needs to do to try to quell the crude market.

[08:05:14]

They see rising costs that they're facing, 13 casualties through this war, hundreds more injured, billions of dollars have expended. And the administration has failed to articulate what their goals and objectives are. So, that's what we see, and that's what the American people feel.

BERMAN: I should note, gas prices ticked down a cent last night. They're still up over a quarter from last week, over 25 cents from last week. And $1.50 since the start. And $1.50 since the war began. But do you see progress? Do you feel as if it could be winding down?

AGUILAR: It's hard -- it's hard to know, because the administration says there's a ceasefire, yet we're still engaging in that. It's just their effort to evade oversight and accountability with the War Powers Act that Marco Rubio says is unconstitutional now, even though as a senator, he felt a different way. So, that's the difficulty that we see.

It's tough to know what progress is, because the administration hasn't articulated to the American people what the clear objectives and what the end game is. What does the president want to see out of this war? When will it end? When can we see relief? That's on the president, and he's failed to do that.

BERMAN: Shifting to the midterms now, which are less than six months away. What's the Democratic midterm message? You're the number three Democrat in the House. What will you do if you retake control of the House?

AGUILAR: We're telling the American people very clearly that you deserve better. We want to fix healthcare. We want to end corruption. We want to lower the costs that people face. That's what they care about. That's what they're getting crushed with. The president campaigned and said that he was going to lower the costs on day one. He said utility costs would be cut in half within a year of his presidency. None of that has happened. It is harder and more expensive. America is too damn expensive right now. The American people feel that. They know that, and House Democrats want to provide relief. They want to provide help, and we know what -- we know how to do that. The president is the one driving up costs.

BERMAN: "Politico," the playbook this morning, which we all read when we wake up, has a focus on what the Republican midterm message is in the message from the White House. And they have a quote from a Republican close to the White House saying, quote -- this is their message: "The Democrats are woke, weak, and way too liberal, a Republican close to the White House told Playbook, we'll make sure every voter in America remembers that."

How do you battle that message?

AGUILAR: I suppose that could be a message if you were in the minority, if you didn't control anything in government. They control every lever of government. They control the House of Representatives. They control the Senate. They control the White House. And to blame Democrats just seems, I mean, this is why the group has 30 percent approval rating. They cannot govern. They cannot lead. They do not have a strategy to lower the cost that people face.

And that's unfortunately what the American people are seeing. So, this is just all smokescreen. And the only way that they win, John, is by suppressing the vote, by going after vote by mail, which they have in the Supreme Court, the Voting Rights Act, ICE at polling places. That is exactly what the American people know.

BERMAN: There's this massive redistricting battle going on right now. And it's still ongoing, even though the midterms are less than six months away. Some of the states considering changing their maps, South Carolina, Louisiana, Tennessee, just did it overnight. One state where Democrats hope to pick up is Virginia, but the Virginia Supreme Court hasn't ruled on the map there yet. How nervous are you?

AGUILAR: We're not nervous. We're waiting on the Supreme Court to certify the election, to allow local elections officials to certify the election. The Virginia Supreme Court allowed the election to go forward. They heard challenges before the election. We're confident that they will uphold this map. And keep in mind, the difference here is Republican legislatures are changing the maps in Louisiana and Tennessee and Florida, where Democrats are having success is going directly to the people.

And so, it would be hard for the Supreme Court to overturn the will of the people, whether that's in California or Virginia, to change their maps. The American people are the ones who are having the last say here.

BERMAN: We're talking about the Virginia Supreme Court, which has yet to rule on this. I do want to ask you, finally, I read an interview from January. You're from California. In January, you weren't ready yet to endorse in the California gubernatorial race. Less than a month away now, the big primary there. Do you have an endorsement?

AGUILAR: I don't have anything to break for you today, but look, we have -- we have a great feeling.

BERMAN: No, you sure? AGUILAR: We have a great feeling --

BERMAN: We got time.

AGUILAR: Look, I think -- I think Xavier Becerra is stepping up. I think he's separating himself from the pack. I look forward to supporting a Democrat in November.

BERMAN: Well, that's a heck of a sentence there. I asked you who you're going to endorse. You said you're not endorsing, but you only mentioned one of the candidates there.

AGUILAR: Yeah, I think he's doing quite well. Look, the Democratic field is incredibly strong. I think they've demonstrated that. CNN hosted a debate the other night. It's a good field, and I look forward to supporting a Democrat in November.

BERMAN: Who might be named?

(OFF MIC)

[08:10:00]

AGUILAR: Nice try, nice try.

BERMAN: Congressman Pete Aguilar, from California.

AGUILAR: You're a good sport.

BERMAN: I appreciate you being with us. Thank you very much.

Sara?

SIDNER: All right, John.

Schools across the country left reeling after hackers took over a popular education platform, the cyberattack comp, comp, compromising. I can't speak because John's got me laughing over here.

The private information of hundreds of millions of students, plus a deadly volcano blast overnight, killing three hikers, and now there is a desperate search underway for possible survivors who are still there.

And an incredible rescue hours after a devastating tornado, frantic meows leading crews to this little guy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh. It's okay.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:15:23] BOLDUAN: This just in, the CDC has now classified its response to the deadly antivirus outbreak as level three. That's the agency's lowest level of emergency. That's according to a person involved in the situation.

And at this hour, the cruise ship hit by that outbreak is on its way to Spain's Canary Islands. Health officials around the globe though, including in the United States, are racing to track and contain and monitor this virus. More than 140 people are still on board, including 17 Americans.

And when they arrive to the islands, they'll disembark and most will be flown home from there. CNN's Salma Abdelaziz is watching all of this and joins us live from London. What's the latest that you're picking up, Salma?

SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN REPORTER: Yes, we just got this press conference from Spanish health officials. As you can imagine, Kate, there's a great deal of concern in the Canary Islands where the ship is meant to dock. Many people there are concerned. They're concerned about the possibility of this virus spreading, about how they and their families can be protected. So, health officials across the Canary Islands, across Spain, have been trying to reassure people and tell them, look, there's going to be a protocol in place when these passengers dock. They say that they've set up a specific ward that's been designed for these passengers once they arrive. They're going to be isolated. They're going to be closed circuit. They're going to have their own entrance.

So, there's a lot of calming and assuaging fears here. But as you mentioned, this is a mammoth, complex and highly sensitive operation that spans across several countries. I mean, you're talking Singapore, France, the U.K., the Netherlands, the United States and many other countries right now that are involved in the contact tracing.

And that's because dozens of people who were on board that cruise ship had left in recent weeks, made their way back home, made their way through public airports, made their way on commercial flights. So, you can imagine just how difficult it is to try to find out who they were in contact with and who may potentially be at risk.

I'm going to give you the U.K. here as an example because British authorities are, of course, monitoring several cases, including of one Brit who is right now in critical condition in Johannesburg. But there's also two Brits that have already landed in the U.K. They are self-isolating at home. They've shown no symptoms, British authorities say, but British authorities are trying to monitor those cases alongside dealing with repatriation.

Because once that ship does dock in the Canary Islands, all of those individuals who come from, I think more than 20 different countries are going to have to get home. And that means Spanish authorities have to coordinate people getting home and getting home safely while they then go into isolation, Kate.

BOLDUAN: Yeah, quite a big effort in trying to get everyone back and safely and contained. I mean, all the things that you're laying out there. Selma, thank you so much.

John?

BERMAN: All right, we have a CNN exclusive. Former inmates say they were punished for speaking out about Ghislaine Maxwell. And then we're just minutes away from the release of the brand-new jobs report. These are some key numbers as some major CEOs are giving warning signs about the economy.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:22:14]

SIDNER: Breaking overnight, a major cyber-attack is disrupting schools nationwide right in the middle of finals week. Hackers shut down Canvas, the platform students use for assignments, grades and exams. Instead of coursework, users were met with a ransom message claiming the system had been breached. CNN's David Goldman has been following this story closely.

This is wild. Look, it's finals week. Everybody's stressed out and now this happens? What's going on?

DAVID GOLDMAN, CNN SENIOR BUSINESS REPORTER: Well, I would have loved this I think as a college student if I was told I can't do my work. Well, all right, what am I going to do? Well, this is actually pretty serious. So, these hackers, they're ransomware hackers, right? They're called shiny hunters. We've heard of them before. They've done this kind of thing before.

Basically what they do is they say we're going to shut down access to this and the way that we're going to extract money is by, you know, saying we've got a lot of data. They claim, they claim they have 275 million users' personal information and billions of direct messages that were sent from people to people on this platform. That's not great if that's true.

Now, they want millions of dollars and so far it seems like the program might be able to come back online without it, but we'll see. They've done this. This is the second hack that they've done of this software. So, the way that they seem to have gotten in was the free- to-use software for teachers. Now, that's shut down, so unfortunately for people who were using this for free, now they don't have access.

SIDNER: Now, are they going after the company itself or are they going after individual users?

GOLDMAN: They're going after the company itself, but if you're the unfortunate person who was using this and now your data lives with these bad guys, you know, you're -- you're kind of out of luck. If they don't pay the ransom and they put all that information online, we know what can happen there.

SIDNER: It's really so disturbing and they're called the shiny hunters, you said?

GOLDMAN: Yeah, they always have clever names.

SIDNER: Maybe we need the K-pop demon hunters to go after the shiny hunters and then this will cancel it all out.

GOLDMAN: That's not a bad idea. I always love when we do cybersecurity stories that we have the clever names and then these clever graphics where it's always someone at a shiny computer or someone wearing black in front of a computer. Yeah, exactly. We got it. We're good.

SIDNER: We're good. All right, David, thank you so much for following this. Appreciate it.

Kate?

BOLDUAN: You guys just solved that whole thing right there. That is good. Moving on. We are standing --

SIDNER: K-pop demon hunters. K-pop demon hunters. I know they love them.

BOLDUAN: Oh, Sara. We are standing by this morning after the White House promise to release -- is promising to release a full report on the hantavirus. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is going to be joining next to answer your questions on this whole situation and the virus.

[08:25:07]

A possible new clue is also in the works in a decades-old murder case. Police are now searching a new location in hopes of finally uncovering Kristin Smart's remains.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: All right, this morning the CDC has classified its response to the deadly hantavirus outbreak as level three. That's the agency's lowest level of emergency. That's according to a person involved in the situation.

[08:30:05]

The cruise ship stricken by the outbreak is on its way to the Canary Islands with more than 140 people on board.