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Biden, Trump To Meet Wednesday For Transition Talks; Trump To Announce Key Administration Positions This Week; Dozens Dead After Israeli Strikes On Lebanon And Gaza. Aired 12-1a ET

Aired November 11, 2024 - 00:00   ET

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

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JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Hello and welcome. I'm Jim Sciutto live in Washington.

On Wednesday, U.S. President Joe Biden will welcome Donald Trump to the White House for a meeting in the Oval Office. The get together has long been a post election tradition in Washington, part of the peaceful transfer of power, one, of course, that Trump cast aside when he lost the 2020 election to Joe Biden, but never conceded that defeat, and still hasn't, four years later.

Now working from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, President-elect Trump is seeing a stream of visits from people who either want spots in his new administration or want to bend his ear about who they believe should get roles. A source tells CNN Trump has offered New York Congresswoman and campaign surrogate and ally Elise Stefanik the job as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Trump announced on Truth Social a short time ago that he will bring back Tom Holman who served as acting director of ICE in the first administration. Holman would be joining the administration in charge of, quote, our nation's borders and, the president-elect says, oversee all deportation of illegal aliens back to their country of origin.

Elon Musk is one person who does not seem to have any desire for a formal role in the new administration but is nonetheless playing a key part in the transition. Alayna Treene has more.

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN REPORTER: Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago home has been a teaming with allies, members, and potential new officials over the last 48 hours, as many people are angling for a top spot in his second administration or trying to influence him and who he will select for those roles. But the one person who has really been looming over all of it has been Elon Musk.

Now, of course, Elon Musk was on stage with Donald Trump, his top campaign advisers, and his team, on Tuesday night, when he declared victory during the election but he's also been at Mar-a-Lago and around Donald Trump in the days since. I'm told many days this week he dined with Donald Trump. Just the day after the election, he brought his children to Trump's Florida home where Donald Trump gave them a tour of his resort. But he's also been sitting in many times when he's been with Donald Trump on some of the calls from foreign leaders, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Now, I'm also told that Elon Musk has been weighing in on some of Donald Trump's potential picks, making it clear to the president-elect who he believes should have that role. And he's also been calling up allies of Donald Trump himself, including lawmakers, and starting to exert his influence in that way as well.

Now, one thing that we saw happen on Sunday is that he came out and waded into the Senate Republican leadership fight. He quickly endorsed Florida Senator Rick Scott after Scott had supported an idea from Donald Trump to allow for recess appointments, essentially trying to make sure that he can swiftly confirm some of his nominees and, in many times, bypass the Senate confirmation process. Three of the men are vying for that spot. But Elon Musk said that he supports Rick Scott.

And all to say, Musk has been very influential. He is very close with Donald Trump specifically. So, in these final weeks before Election Day, where he has been out there campaigning for the former president, and now he is spending a lot of time with Donald Trump and making it clear that he's going to be a top person who Donald Trump relies on as we look ahead.

Now, sources familiar with the conversations say that Musk is not expected to take on some formal role in Donald Trump's second administration. Donald Trump has mused before that he would love for him to be a cabinet secretary. However, Musk and others believe that he could have just as much power on the outside.

Alayna Treene, CNN, West Palm Beach, Florida.

SCIUTTO: Earlier, I spoke about Musk's role and influence with Mark Longabaugh, a Democratic strategist who worked on Bernie Sanders' 2016 campaign, and Asa Hutchinson, former Republican governor of Arkansas, now resident fellow at the Harvard Institute of Politics. I started by asking Mark for his thoughts about Musk's very conspicuous role in the Trump transition.

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MARK LONGABAUGH, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: One of the most extraordinary situations that we've had in history, we've got a billionaire individual who has literally billions of dollars at stake in terms of government contracts, and whether they're satellites, space related situations.

And I would just say, you know, Trump ran the early part of this campaign blasting the transition to electric vehicles, but backed off of that once Musk endorsed him. So, I think it's very, very troubling the kind of influence that this billionaire outsider who actually also, let's be clear, owns one of the, you know, key social media news influencing with X that we have in our society. So, I just think it's troubling all the way around, and what we can do to stop it, I'm not quite clear.

SCIUTTO: Listen, yes, he backed off his sort of blanket attacks on electric vehicles, but still tried to appeal to union voters in states such as Michigan concerned about transition to election vehicles raises the issue as to whether he provide cover for Tesla, but not for other automakers that make electric vehicles.

Listen, it's a long list of things, and, Governor Hutchinson, you referenced that big picture in terms of a disappearance of guardrails. So, tell me, do you think in the Republican Party, given that Republicans will control the Senate as well, likely the House, are there Republicans who you believe maintain an interest in guardrails and a willingness to back them up? You know Republicans who've attempted to stand up to Trump have been, well, they've been voted off the island, as it were, but do you believe that there are Republicans in the Senate, the House who are willing to rescue some guardrails?

FMR. GOV. ASA HUTCHINSON (R-AR): Well, clearly Donald Trump goes in with a serious mandate different than the first term. He won the popular vote. He surprised everybody with the strength of his showing with the Electoral College. Clearly, that resonates with Republican House and Senate members. And so they're very attuned to that in their states and districts as the level of support of Donald Trump.

So, he's going to have deference. He's going to have a lot of swag as he goes into his agenda and is broadly supported, whether it's border security, whether it is reforming the Justice Department or whether it is in the international arena. So, he has broad support going in there. He's going to have a season of grace, but it's going to be tested. It's going to be tested. And we'll see whether the Republicans will stand up and whether it's a recess appointments that they push back on or whether it's some other way that the administration tries to bypass Congress, it will be tested and it's unknown as to the outcome of that right now.

SCIUTTO: So, Mark, who leads the way for Democrats at this point? I mean, let's be frank, it's not clear. So, who do you think has a chance, right, to lead the way, not just in terms of walking the Democratic party back to elect electoral viability in the midterms and in the next presidential cycle, but in terms of leading, I think resistance is too strong a word, but trying to hold back some of the more extreme parts of the Trump agenda from the Democratic perspective.

LONGABAUGH: Well, listen, I think we are in for a long period of reassessment and rebuilding the party. I mean, clearly this was a devastating defeat. It looks like the Republicans will control both houses of Congress.

But if I were to say in terms of the frontlines, obviously, we've got governors in major states across the country that I think are already -- you know, Gavin Newsom in California, Pritzker in Illinois, even our nominee for vice president, Waltz in Minnesota, who have signaled that they're not going to roll over and let Donald Trump trample, you know, the prerogatives and rights of the citizens of their states. So, I think that's going to be one nexus.

And I also think the house is going to be right on the knife's edge. You know, it does look like the Republicans are going to grab it but, you know, we still have an outside shot. Whichever way it goes, it's going to be, it's going to be razor thin.

And so I think Hakeem Jeffries is a new and younger leader and I think he could be a forceful figure in terms of putting these guardrails that Governor Hutchinson's talked about trying to put some of those in place.

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SCIUTTO: Well, we will see, and we will look at the implications of Trump's reelection beyond America's borders as well, starting with the Middle East, where the Israeli prime minister has already had several conversations with the president-elect, that relationship very close through the years. We're going to have that story coming up

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SCIUTTO: To the Middle East now, where the Israeli military says it was targeting terrorists on Sunday when it bombed Jabalya in Gaza. You can see the bombed out buildings, people desperately searching for survivors in the rubble. One NGO says two dozen people were killed by Israel in this strike.

This was the scene in Central Gaza where 14 people were injured after a strike on a tent there. Across Gaza, some 40 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes on Sunday alone. And this is video from Lebanon, the town of Almat in the central part of the country. The health ministry says at least 23 people lost their lives in an Israeli strike there, including seven children, again, civilian casualties of Israeli military action.

Almat, a Shiite Muslim majority village, it's outside, though, of Hezbollah's usual strongholds in the south and the east. According to local media, 80 people were killed in Lebanon and Gaza just since Saturday.

The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, he is eager to turn the page on what was at times a difficult relationship with the Biden administration now with Donald Trump heading back to the White House. As Matthew Chance reports, the prime minister and President elect have already been speaking about what lies ahead for the U.S. and Israel.

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CHIEF GLOBAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, says he and President- elect Trump have spoken three times in recent days, a sign of just how closely the two figures are now collaborating. Netanyahu described the conversations as very good and important and, quote, aimed at strengthening the alliance between Israel and the United States. He added that he and Trump see, quote, eye to eye on the Iranian threat and the dangers that it poses.

Well, Netanyahu was among the first leaders to congratulate Trump after his U.S. election victory last week, calling it the world's greatest comeback. Many Israelis expect the Trump administration will offer full-throated support to the Jewish state, especially amid an ongoing Israeli confrontation with Iran and its allies in the region.

Matthew Chance, CNN, Jerusalem.

SCIUTTO: There is some speculation here in the U.S., also in Israel, that Donald Trump will give Netanyahu free rein to conduct his wars in Gaza, Lebanon, perhaps in Iran as well.

Is that what's going to happen? I posed that question to Steven Cook, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

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STEVEN COOK, SENIOR FELLOW, MIDDLE EASTERN STUDIES, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS: I think it is a lot of spinning that is going on among supporters of both Israel and President Trump. We know that President Trump has, when he has spoken to Prime Minister Netanyahu, even before the election, but certainly since the election, has told Prime Minister Netanyahu to get the war in Gaza over by the time he is inaugurated president.

Now, he doesn't have any control over what the Israelis do or American policy until then, but there is that signal that Trump will support whatever it is the Israelis feel that they need to do, but that they need to wrap things up by January 20th, 2025.

In Lebanon, there seems to be the potential for diplomatic deal underway that the Israelis are fully in support of. And when it comes to Iran, President Trump has pursued in his first term what was called maximum pressure, but maximum pressure wasn't really aimed at anything other than bringing the Iranians to the table so that the president could negotiate a better deal than the one that his predecessor, Barack Obama, had negotiated with the Iranians over Iran's nuclear program.

The idea that the president-elect was when he was first in office somehow stronger than any of his predecessors when it came to any of these issues is really just has to go back to his bellicose rhetoric, but it doesn't have really anything to do with his policies.

SCIUTTO: Well, so let's talk -- two questions about Iran, first on any potential negotiations. The world has changed in the last four years, and the fact is Israel is far -- sorry, Iran is far closer to nuclear weapon than it was under the JCPOA, which Donald Trump blew up in his first administration. It has many hundreds of kilograms of fissile material necessary to build a bomb. It's close, perhaps days, weeks away, as you know.

How does Donald Trump navigate that new reality? And is Iran even willing to make a deal given the threat it sees?

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I mean, Israel has certainly exposed the weaknesses in Iran's defenses with its recent attacks.

COOK: Undoubtedly the case, but these are details that President Trump, when he was first in office didn't pay much attention to. The president is mostly interested in negotiating a deal so he could say that he got a deal. He fashions himself as a master negotiator. His -- the book that put him on the map was called The Art of the Deal. And he has everything to prove coming back to office that he can turn up the pressure on the Iranians and bring them back to the negotiating table.

His State Department, the head of his State Department transition team, has as much admitted that the pressure will come on very, very quickly. But this is not a president who is interested in either regime change or a war with Iran.

SCIUTTO: The question, of course, is what is Iran interested in?

Still to come, it is hard to tell what Donald Trump will do about Ukraine once he enters the White House. We're going to look at how his inconsistent rhetoric could give us a glimpse into his future policies.

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SCIUTTO: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Russia launched more than 800 guided bombs, 600 drones, and 20 other missiles just last week, including a record number of 145 drones Saturday night, which damaged residential buildings and shops in Odessa.

Ukraine launched its largest drone attack on Moscow overnight, Russia says. Its forces shot down all 34 drones. It blames shrapnel for the damage you see there.

Earlier, I spoke with Kurt Volker. He's former U.S. ambassador to NATO, as well as a former U.S. special representative for Ukraine negotiations. We spoke about where Donald Trump stands on Ukraine, especially given his attacks on the Ukrainian president and blaming Ukraine and NATO for Russia's invasion in 2022. I asked Volker whether Donald Trump believes it or if it's just campaign talk.

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KURT VOLKER, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO NATO: What you said about the views of some people on the far right is exactly right. They have said those things, they believe those things, they think Zelenskyy is corrupt or not a serious leader, taking American money, blah, blah, blah. Trump has never said those things. And so we need to appreciate the fact that he is maintaining a distance between all of those points of view.

He has also not criticized Vladimir Putin. He's not said that this is a Russian aggression that needs to stop. But my view is that the reason why he is not criticizing Putin is because he knows he ultimately has to reach a deal with Putin. And so he's not demonizing him, but that doesn't mean that he misunderstands the situation on the ground. I think we have to see how this plays out.

And I would just remind viewers that it was actually President Trump who reversed the Obama administration's arms embargo on Ukraine. For years, we had a ban on lethal assistance to Ukraine, which Trump reversed and not because he was all of a sudden, you know, challenging Vladimir Putin, quite the opposite. He was even having this conference in Helsinki in 2018, but it was very warm towards Vladimir Putin, but he was setting the stage for future negotiations.

SCIUTTO: Well, to be fair, yes, he did allow the supply of lethal aid to Ukraine. But as you know, he also suspended military assistance to Ukraine as he was pressuring Zelenskyy to open up an investigation against the man who was going to be running against him in the 2020 election. So, it's been an uneven record at best as regards Ukraine.

And we should note, you know, it's not just folks floating out in the right wing, you know, Twittersphere, who have made such claims. J.D. Vance, I mean, he, in the last days of the campaign, you know, said something along the lines of who are the good guys and bad guys in a war that, as you well know, was started when Russia invaded.

So, I just wonder when you put that together and you also add into it the president-elect's frequent criticism of NATO and his public statements along the lines of, well, if you don't pay enough money, then Russia do whatever the hell you want to the east, I mean, it raises at a minimum reasonable questions about his commitment to Ukraine. Yes.

VOLKER: No, for sure. And I think that the point that I would go to is where Trump consistently says every time he's asked about this, he says, oh, this would never have happened if I was president.

SCIUTTO: Right.

VOLKER: Well, what do you think he means by that? I think he means that Biden is weak and he would be strong, and he would be seen as strong in the world.

Now, that may be his own vision of himself and things, but if that is his vision, that he is going to be strong in contrast to Biden's weakness, then that means there needs to be a stronger posture towards Vladimir Putin.

And he often points to Afghanistan as a catastrophe for the Biden administration, this American withdrawal, this embarrassment, and he didn't do that. He cannot afford for Ukraine to be his Afghanistan.

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SCIUTTO: We'll be watching closely. Well, in the coming hours, the COP29 Climate Summit will get underway. But in the wake of Trump's reelection, a major shadow looms over the global fight to combat climate change. Trump has called it all a hoax. We're going to have the details ahead.

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SCIUTTO: The U.N. Climate Change Conference gets underway in less than two hours. This year's conference being held through November 22nd in Azerbaijan.

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Nearly 200 countries will take part, but the meeting is overshadowed by Donald Trump's vow to withdraw the U.S. once again from the 2015 Paris Climate Accord.

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HARJEET SINGH, FOSSIL FUEL NON-PROLIFERATION TREATY INITIATIVE: Trump winning elections is a huge setback to not only climate talks, but global cooperation in general. We know he's likely to reverse all clean energy policies and incentives in the U.S. He's going to go for fossil fuel extraction much more, which is going to be devastating for the planet. And he's not going to provide any climate finance, which is so vital for developing countries to transition away from fossil fuels.

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SCIUTTO: Some big changes, our Chief Climate Correspondent Bill Weir reports on what's at stake at this year's COP29.

BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, COP29 opens on Monday in Baku, Azerbaijan, a tiny little petro state on the Caspian Sea. The Conference of the Parties, as they're known, this is the 29th of them. The last one, a year ago, had the world agreeing to turn away from the fossil fuel era, that dirty and polluting planet cooking fuels, that era is over, it's time to electrify.

Well, another petro state posting it now with questions about their intentions, whether to use this to exploit more oil and gas deals or really try to bring your policy together. And then casting the biggest call of all is the election in the United States. Donald Trump reelected as the most notorious climate denier in recent global history threatening to claw back and undo as much of the Biden climate agenda as he possibly can. Some of it has momentum, especially in red Republican states. Ground is broken on big projects.

And it'll be tough to claw those back, but we'll see if he tries to end new rules on tailpipe emissions and power plant rules, incentives for families to electrify with cleaner stoves or furnaces. All of those are questionable, especially with the House of Representatives up for grabs. So, that reality is will cast a pall on all the climate diplomacy in Baku this week. President Biden was never really planning to attend this. There are diplomats from the U.S., but what kind of promises can they make with so much uncertainty for what comes next?

And at the same time, all of this is playing out. Copernicus, the European space and weather agency, basically says is the data shows 2024 will be the first to shatter that 1.5 degrees Celsius ceiling that everyone agreed to back in 2016 in the Paris Accords.

This was the first full year above that that limit. That's almost about 3 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than we were before the industrial revolution right now. The warmer it gets, the more fossil fuel pollution blankets the sky, the wilder and crazier the weather is going to get. The more this wildfire phenomenon takes off in confounding ways. Out in Los Angeles the winds were so strong they had to ground firefighting airplanes and had to worry more about evacuations than actually putting out house fires. Adaptation is everything these days and it seems to be happening, the calamity faster than that people can adapt while the politics around this issue are going in the opposite direction.

Bill Weir, CNN, New York.

SCIUTTO: Pakistani authorities are urging residents of Lahore to stay home while schools and other public places have been closed. Why? Because of record pollution levels. Last week's the city's air quality index again pushed 1,000 mark. That's high. It's more than three times the level deemed hazardous.

CNN's Sophia Saifi has the story.

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SOPHIA SAIFI, CNN PRODUCER (voice over): The traffic is still flowing in Lahore. The government officials are urging people to stay at home. The smog, too toxic.

For a city that often ranks as one of the worst in the world for air pollution, face masks are mandatory, a thin shield against the skyrocketing amount of pollutants in the air. The city's air quality index stopped 1,000 again last week. That's an unprecedented level, as the I.Q. Air Index defines hazardous as anything over 301.

Many public spaces like zoos, parks, and historic monuments, have been closed, along with many schools which have shifted to online classes for at least another week.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everyone has a right to clean air. Everyone has a right to enjoy seeing the sun.

SAIFI: Some types of tuk tuks and barbecue restaurants have been banned, but the smog is a recurring problem, especially at this time of the year, when particles from low grade diesel fumes and crop burning get trapped in the cold air. And some residents say that the closures aren't stopping that.

MOHAMMAD QASIM, LAHORE VISITOR: They have closed schools that don't create the smog. They have not closed the factories and break kilns.

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They are now closing the things which create the smog.

SAIFI: Delhi's air has also reached hazardous levels in recent days, though some residents are still exercising outdoors The World Health Organization says breathing toxic air is harmful and can cause strokes, heart diseases and respiratory infections.

One clinic in New Delhi says there is a 20 to 25 percent rise in patients, especially after the Diwali holiday, when people set off illegal fireworks. Sore throats burning eyes and trouble breathing are common complaints.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have a severe cold and cough no medicine seems to be working. I have been taking medicines, but there is no relief.

SAIFI: Officials in New Delhi began a trial program recently to spray water from drones to clear away dust and pollutants But critics say this is just a band aid And the small problem in South Asia is in need of more long-term solutions.

Sophia Saifi, CNN.

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SCIUTTO: Just incredible. I'm Jim Sciutto. For viewers joining us from North America, I'll be right back with more news right after the break. For everyone else, World Sport is next.

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SCIUTTO: It's a move that could define the GOP Senate leadership battle but also disrupt the Senate's role in confirmation of senior appointees. Donald Trump is now demanding support for recess appointments from the Republican senators vying to be majority leader. That would essentially allow Trump's cabinet picks to bypass congressional approval. He says it's to expedite the confirmation process. The president-elect says the votes have taken too long in the past.

All three senators running in this week's secret ballot election quickly, and not surprisingly, signaled support for Trump's idea.

Well, New York may be a solidly blue state, but Republicans still managed to net some wins and even flips in that state this week.

CNN's Gloria Pazmino has more.

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GLORIA PAZMINO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): New York City just got a little more Republican. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: From corner to corner of New York City, we saw the Republicans gaining traction.

PAZMINO: here in Brooklyn. Republican Stephen Chan defeated State Senator Iwen Chu, the Democratic incumbent, in a race defined by public safety, opposition to a homeless shelter in the district and concern about newly arrived migrants.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: People are not happy with the way things are going and they want change.

PAZMINO: While Harris easily carried the city with about 68 percent of the vote compared to Trump's 30 percent, Trump made significant gains this election cycle. Roughly 94,000 more people voted for Trump than in 2020.

FRAN VELLA-MARONE, KINGS COUNTY CONSERVATIVE PARTY CHAIRPERSON: If you look at a map of southern Brooklyn now after this election, it's going to be actually almost all red.

PAZMINO: Trump made gains across all of New York City. The most significant shifts were in neighborhoods with large Asian and Latino communities. He narrowed the gap in the Bronx, parts of Queens, and here in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn, where Asians, generations of Italians, and Latinos live and work side by side.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When we came, nobody supported us. Nobody gave us a handout. We went to work.

PAZMINO: More than 200,000 migrants have arrived in New York City since the spring of 2022. The crisis has manifested across different cities but has been particularly heartfelt here.

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT-ELECT: They're poisoning the blood of our country. That's what they've done.

PAZMINO: Why are so many immigrants willing to support that kind of language?

CHAN: They understand exactly what President Trump is talking about. He understands that President Trump is not talking about them.

PAZMINO: This family from Ecuador agrees.

SILVANA SARI, TRUMP SUPPORTER: We need a change. Economy is really a mess right now. It's affecting all families.

PAZMINO: Sari and her husband say they've spent years working to open up a barbershop and put their kids to school.

SARI: He has to work 14 hours a day to have what he has right now to have a business open. And it's not fair another business open in the corner with no permit, with no insurance. I don't think it's fair at all.

PAZMINO: Republican operatives see Trump's inroads in New York as the beginning of what's to come, a chance to grow their party and elect more Republicans right here in Blue New York.

VELLA-MARONE: Hochul better watch out. We're going to come after her. And she's going to be in trouble. And I believe that we can win the governor's race in two years.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PAZMINO (on camera): Now, Governor Hochul's reelection is less than two years away. We asked her about the results. She told us that Democrats across the state should not be taking their voters for granted.

Gloria Pazmino, CNN, New York.

SCIUTTO: Trump's victory was the result of many things, but voters have repeatedly said the top issue for them in this election was the economy.

By several major metrics, the U.S. economy is strong, but poll after poll showed Americans saw it largely negatively. Part of this is prices. Home prices reached record highs for 15 straight months. And although inflation rates are now down close to 2 percent, prices on goods still are roughly 20 percent higher now than they were when Biden took office.

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Ultimately, a significant number of voters blame Biden and Vice President Harris for not making enough progress to bring down prices and quickly enough.

Earlier, I spoke with CNN Global Economic Analyst Rana Foroohar, about the impact that Trump's policies will have on prices. You might want to listen to her response.

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RANA FOROOHAR, CNN GLOBAL ECONOMIC ANALYST: One of the things you have to start from is the fact that we actually have a very strong economy and that's one of the great ironies. There is an inflation issue. It is -- as you pointed out, it's been cumulative over time. It hurt working people in important ways. And it's very rare for an incumbent to be able to come back after a big inflation hike during their tenure. And if you think about the Biden-Harris administration as one, that's the case.

Now, how did Trump's policies look going forward? Yes, they are inflationary. What's interesting is that it's possible that you could see now this good economy that we have start to overheat because of some of the things that Trump wants to put into place.

Let's assume he were to put his tariff proposals into place. That's immediately inflationary. It hits consumers right in their pocketbook. It makes goods more expensive. Unlike the Biden administration, the Trump administration doesn't really have an industrial strategy to bolster American exports, which would be the whole point of having a tariff to try and make American goods more competitive. But there really isn't that kind of growth plan.

On the other hand, there is a plan to, to use debt and deficit spending to bolster kind of what I would call a saccharin sort of a growth, a bit of a sugar high. The markets like that, they like the idea of tax cuts, but, again, that just kind of creates a stock bubble. It creates an asset bubble. And to be honest, that's one of the things I think that really is in play with working people in this country being so angry. If you make your money from the stock market, you're doing great. If you make it from a paycheck, you're not.

And so this terrible irony for me is that swing state voters that thought Trump was going to make inflation better, their lot may really end up being worse in the next year or two.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: We'll watch those numbers. Will President elect Trump's promise of steep across the board tariffs on imports to the U.S., with a significant tax on goods coming from China, is already changing the way some companies are doing business there? Could Trump's past relationship with Chinese President Xi Jinping influence this decision? Is there room for negotiation?

CNN's Marc Stewart joins us now live from Beijing. Marc, I'm curious from the view where you are in Beijing, how does the Chinese government, how do the Chinese people view the relationship between Trump and Xi?

MARC STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Jim, good to see you. Look, as you know from spending time in China yourself, the relationship between the U.S. and Beijing is always a fragile one, and this moment is no exception. Beijing really is trying to play it safe, and it's very evident in the diplomatic speak that we are getting from the government. Just for an example, President Xi Jinping did congratulate President-elect Trump.

And looking at the readout from the government about what was said, I mean, among the phrases that are used, win-win cooperation, mutual respect, peaceful coexistence, getting along will benefit both countries and the world. So, that's the official stance that Beijing is taking as it enters this very murky tide.

But the relationship between these two world leaders is one that is complicated. I'm thinking back to early on in the first Trump administration when Xi Jinping and President Trump were having chocolate cake together at Mar-a-Lago. It signaled a very strong point or a strong potential for relations between the two nations.

But then things turned frosty. I mean, among the issues that made things cloudy was China's response to COVID. That certainly irked President Trump. And then this thorny issue of trade and tariffs, which are somehow -- well, not somehow. They are once again making its way to center stage. Not necessarily a surprise.

So, will things begin where they left off? I mean, that's what Beijing would certainly like at least on those high memories from early on in the Trump administration, Jim.

SCIUTTO: No question. Listen, it's arguably going to be one of the most consequential relationships for the second Trump term. We know you'll follow it closely for us. Marc Stewart in Beijing, thanks so much.

And thanks so much to all of you for joining us this Sunday evening and early Monday morning.

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I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington.

CNN Newsroom continues with my colleague, Erica Hill, just after the break.

Monday morning, I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington, CNN Newsroom continues with my colleague Erica Hill just after the break.

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