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CNN International: RFK Jr. Heads To Capitol Hill In Bid To Become Health Secretary; German Chancellor Scholz Loses Confidence Vote; Trump And SoftBank CEO Speak On American Investment. Aired 11a- 12p ET
Aired December 16, 2024 - 11:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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ERICA HILL, HOST, "CNN NEWSROOM": Welcome to our viewers from around the world I'm Erica Hill in New York.
Ahead on CNN Newsroom, it is a critical week for President-elect Donald Trump's cabinet picks on Capitol Hill. And we're also standing by this hour for remarks from the President-elect on what is being billed as an American investment. Plus, we are live in Berlin this hour where Germany's leader just lost a no-confidence vote, setting up for an early national election. And few answers, but a whole lot of frustration, as more drone incidents fuel anxieties across the U.S.
Good to have you with us this hour. We are waiting on remarks from Donald Trump in West Palm Beach, Florida, which are set to include the announcement of a multibillion dollar investment from Japan's SoftBank. The company's CEO is at Mar-a-Lago to meet with the President-elect about that investment and a related promise to create 100,000 jobs. We'll continue to monitor that and bring you those remarks.
Meantime, it is a critical week for one of President-elect Trump's most controversial cabinet picks. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump's choice for Health and Human Services, is set to meet with Republican senators on the Hill today. Kennedy's controversial stance on vaccines and his denial of proven science, in many cases, are starting to come up in those meetings ahead of what are expected to be some very contentious confirmation hearings.
Donald Trump, meantime, offering another public show of support for his pick to head the Defense Department. Pete Hegseth joining him there at the Army-Navy college football game over the weekend, and of course, you also see there the Vice President-elect.
Much to discuss with Margaret Talev, a senior contributor for Axios, who is the Director of the Democracy, Journalism, and Citizenship Institute at Syracuse University. Margaret, always good to see you.
Let's start, if we could, with what is expected on Capitol Hill, with RFK Jr. making his way to the Hill. I was also struck by this warning from Mitch McConnell at the end of last week that anyone seeking Senate confirmation should avoid the appearance or association with efforts to discredit proven medical science. There is going to be a lot to dig into with RFK Jr.
MARGARET TALEV, SENIOR CONTRIBUTOR, AXIOS, & DIRECTOR, DEMOCRACY, JOURNALISM & CITIZENSHIP INSTITUTE AT SYRACUSE UNIV.: Yes. And I think you're right to note that efforts around vaccines and efforts to diminish vaccines, especially for issues like polio, which is close to eradication, the idea that children could be re-exposed to some of these illnesses, that's going to be really problematic for several senators. And remember, the margins are so close, it really only takes a few senators to sink a confirmation.
But, on the other hand, we've really seen the President-elect be able to stave off what looked like real problems for Pete Hegseth that he may now have a second chance. So, Trump's political will and leverage and senators' fear of being primaried is also very real. And I think that's where the rubber is going to meet the road, is sort of between the political concerns, but also the policy concerns of rolling back things like major advancements in vaccinations and healthcare for children.
HILL: And to that point, Margaret, we're seeing these pictures now on screen, of course, of Pete Hegseth, who -- there was a moment when it seemed like that was not going to happen. Very clearly, the President- elect continuing to show his support, bringing him to the Army-Navy game over the weekend. There is also this sense in Washington of basically how many times Republicans can say no to the President- elect, so that would -- in terms of his choices and his nominees, but when there are so many who are controversial, watching how that will play out, it's the RFK versus Tulsi Gabbard, who was not getting great reviews from her initial meetings, versus the Pete Hegseth's, is there a sense of where that stands, even though we are still a number of weeks out from confirmation hearings?
TALEV: I don't know what the magic number is, and I think to some extent it does actually depend on these confirmation hearings. It certainly looks like Kash Patel, who would have been one of the most controversial of these for FBI seems to have much less resistance among Republican senators than one might have originally thought, given some of his background.
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And I think you're seeing all of this play out against the President- elect's real efforts to show strength economically. I know the SoftBank announcement that we are expecting to come very soon is really another lever for him. He is going to view his mechanism to maintain that leverage over senators as a measure of whether he can juice the economy and have strong showing of numbers for things like job commitments, investment commitments, especially if he is going to pursue some of these tariffs and things that could have a counterbalance.
HILL: Yeah. It's such a great point, and it sets me up well. Margaret, thank you. Stand by as we wait for those remarks, because we will play those and then, of course, bring you back to chat about those in just a moment.
We are also, though, following breaking news out of Berlin at this hour, where German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has just lost a confidence vote, a vote, of course, that he called for, and that move now paves the way for elections in February. We have live pictures for you of the Bundestag in Berlin. President Frank-Walter Steinmeier can now move, of course, to dissolve the legislature and then formally declare the already agreed upon Election Day of February 23rd. All of this coming after Germany's governing coalition collapsed last month.
CNN's Sebastian Shukla is tracking the story, joining us now live with the developments from Berlin tonight. A totally unexpected outcome, but just walk us through what happens now, if you would.
SEBASTIAN SHUKLA, CNN FIELD PRODUCER: Yeah, Erica. I'm still in the belly of the Bundestag here, actually in the room just behind me is where the vote recently took its conclusion. What I have for you here is the outcome of the votes, which is, Scholz lost this vote of confidence in himself, the semantics around it are important, by 394 votes against him to 207 in favor of him. So, that's a sizable number who have said that, look, this country needs to adopt a new chancellor and needs to embark on trying to form a new coalition government.
As you said, the process around this now is that Scholz will head to the President's residence, where he will then go and ask to formally dissolve parliament. But, the way that this whole process, including the build up to getting to this day, the vote of confidence, has been very regimented and controlled by the parties who have already informally agreed when that election is going to be, and it will be on the 23rd of February. Technically, the President has 21 days to decide on the day.
But, it is almost a foregone conclusion, and Erica, the foregone conclusion is also being echoed by what was said in that chamber earlier today. I want you to take a listen to what Olaf Chancellor -- Olaf Scholz, the chancellor, had to say when he was on his feet in there earlier.
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OLAF SCHOLZ, GERMAN CHANCELLOR (Interpreted): Democracy requires parties to compete against each other with different proposals, as we will do in the upcoming campaign. But, democracy also requires all those who believe in it to be prepared to work together for the good of the country after an election, to build bridges, to forge compromises. This is not possible without moral maturity, without decency and seriousness. It is only possible with a sense of responsibility for our entire country, for all our citizens.
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SHUKLA: And so, you can hear there that the chancellor was almost already resigned to the fact he knew he was going to lose this vote and that Germany would move forward with elections. You could hear in there too that he was setting up the campaigning that is about to take place that will start in earnest now. He was alluding in there to the polls, which show that the CDU, the
conservative party here in Germany, are way ahead, and that his party, the SPD, the Social Democrats, are lagging in third, sometimes potentially even falling far back as fourth, and that has left open the door to what will be a seismic change in German politics, which would be that the AfD, the far-right populist party here, could come in second place, and though they will view themselves as potential kingmakers, that will create a very difficult dynamic when it comes to forming coalition, a coalition government here, because that is usually how Germany's governments are formed.
And so, we will wait to see now, but it is clear pretty much, Erica, that Germany will have a more conservative chancellor and government come February.
HILL: Certainly. Sebastian Shukla with the latest for us. Appreciate it. Thank you.
Also with me to discuss, the Chief Europe correspondent for POLITICO, for joining us from Berlin, Matthew Karnitschnig. Good to have you with us, Matthew. So, as we look at where things stand, if we just pick up actually where my colleague Sebastian just left off, looking at what potentially could be the makeup there, as we look at some of that polling, CDU obviously in the lead there, right, with almost a third of the vote, as we look at some of this polling, but the fact that the AfD, this far-right party is in second place, ahead of the SPD, which in some cases is even in fourth place, what does that tell you about where the country itself is headed?
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MATTHEW KARNITSCHNIG, CHIEF EUROPE CORRESPONDENT, POLITICO: Well, it tells us that the German population is really unhappy with the blue establishment, and it's a story that we've seen really all across Europe in recent years and in the United States and other parts of the democratic world. In Germany, because of its history, this development is particularly alarming to many people, which is why the establishment parties here have ruled out working with the AfD in a coalition, as we just heard. For now, all of the big parties, the CDU and the SPD, have said that they will, under no circumstance, collaborate with the AfD. But, what that means is it really narrows the coalition options after the election, because, as you can see from that polling, the AfD is getting almost 20 percent of the vote.
HILL: Which is really something to see, a number that large. The economy, understandably, is also going to play a central role in this election come February.
KARNITSCHNIG: Absolutely. Germany has been experiencing really high inflation in recent years in the wake of the pandemic, similar to what we've seen in the United States. But, beyond that, the German economy has been stagnating for five years. The German economy has only grown 0.1 percent since 2019. That compares to 12 percent real growth in the United States over that period. And if you look at what just happened to the Democrats, you can see that the economic issues in Germany are going to loom large in this election. Every week there is another announcement of mass layoffs at one of the big sort of German car makers or foreign companies. Ford announced recently it's going to lay off thousands of workers, as has VW and a number of others.
So, people are really feeling the economic pain, and when that happens, obviously they blame the incumbent. So, Olaf Scholz and his Social Democrats really have a tough road to hoe here in the coming weeks.
HILL: Yeah. As you note, it is a well-known story at this point in a number of countries around the globe. When we look at too what is coming down the pike, this threat of tariffs from President-elect Donald Trump that is also weighing, obviously, on a number of economies, how much is that figuring into the discussion in Germany?
KARNITSCHNIG: I think for now it's a little bit in the background. It's more of an elite discussion that people here tend to be very afraid of Donald Trump and what he might do. The Germans had a somewhat unhappy experience with him the last time he was President, because he demanded that they pay more for defense, for example, and I think that's a theme that we're going to see once again. And Trump has already signaled that he is going to demand, in particular, of the Germans, that they do more on that front. People are now discussing three percent of GDP instead of two percent for defense, and the Germans have had difficulty even getting to the two percent mark.
So, this is going to make life, I think, very difficult for this next government, because they're going to have to weigh the kind of social spending that many Germans have become to lie on (h) and expect with the security needs that the country has, and at the same time, they have a very rigid debt break in Germany, which is the reason that this last government collapsed, in fact, because the three parties in that coalition couldn't agree on spending.
So, this is going to be a very difficult period for Germany in the years ahead, particularly because the economy doesn't look like it's going to recover anytime soon, and there are a lot of spending priorities that they have to address here.
HILL: There is also the broader issue, right, as to how this fits into the overall puzzle of Europe, when we were talking about, of course, Europe's largest economy, normally incredibly stable to be at this point. We see what's happening at France -- in France as well. Moving into 2025, it's not just Germany, perhaps, that is looking at a period of instability and concern.
KARNITSCHNIG: That's absolutely right. And Germany, of course, is known as the economic motor of Europe. And at the moment, it really is sputtering, and that has an effect on all of the neighboring countries, because the big German companies here that we think of the industrial companies, machinery makers, chemical makers and so forth, they have a really strong network of operations in Central and Eastern Europe as well. And those economies are also going to face pressures because of the German weakness.
So, this is going to have sort of political ripples, I think, across Europe, if the Germans can't manage to turn this around, and especially with the crisis, really, the political crisis in France at the moment, it doesn't really bode well for the kind of political stability that Germans hold so dear.
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And with the far right resurgent here, that's another --
HILL: Yeah.
KARNITSCHNIG: -- big concern, and we haven't mentioned the issue of migration, which is also quite potent here, as it is in other parts of Europe. And the government, so far, the last government, has really struggled to get its arms around that issue as well.
HILL: Yes. Absolutely a lot there. Matt, we really appreciate you joining us with your perspective and your expertise. Thank you.
I want to take you back now to Florida where President-elect Donald Trump is speaking on American investments from Mar-a-Lago. Let's listen in.
DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT AND CURRENT PRESIDENTIAL- ELECT: -- investment and technology companies anywhere in the world, one of the most successful investors in the world. And we've just concluded a very productive meeting, and today I am thrilled to announce that SoftBank will be investing $100 billion in America, creating 100,000 American jobs at a minimum. And he is doing this because he feels very optimistic about our country since the election and many other people are also coming in with tremendous amounts of money.
You probably noticed that the poll was just taken. Its business is literally, in 39 years, there has been nothing like it. It's been the biggest increase. Small business owners gave it a 41 percent jump. It's the biggest jump that we've had in 39 years. Nobody has ever seen anything like it, and it's just a very -- they're very optimistic.
This historic investment is a monumental demonstration of confidence in America's future, and it will help ensure that artificial intelligence, emerging technologies and other industries of tomorrow are built, created and grown right here in the USA. One of the beautiful things about Masa is he is very much involved with emerging technology. He probably knows it may be better than almost anybody. So, it's a great honor.
And some of you remember, after the 2016 election, also SoftBank committed to invest $50 billion in our country, and they did, and I'm pleased to say that they kept that promise in every way, shape and form. And now they're looking to do $100 million. And I've looked at their books. They do have the possibility of doing more. I'm going to ask them to do a little bit more. But, first, I'm going to ask him to speak, and just to say a few words. Masa, please. Thank you.
MASAYOSHI SON, CEO, SOFTBANK: Thank you. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you so much. I'm very, very excited. I would really like to celebrate the great victory of President Trump, and my confidence level to the economy of the United States has tremendously increased with his victory. So, because of that, I'm now excited to commit this $100 billion and 100,000 jobs into the United States. This is double of last time, as President Trump said, because I say, oh, President Trump is a double down President. I'm going to have to double down $100 billion and 100,000 jobs. This is my confidence level, because that has doubled down.
So, I am truly excited to make this happen. And of course, business is important. Technology is important. But, one more thing I'm really hoping is that this President Trump would make the world -- bring the world into peace again. That's my additional hope, and I think he will actually make it happen. So, anyway, I'm excited to go, and we were discussing, and President Trump said, Masa, double down is not enough. Maybe go for more, right?
TRUMP: I'm going to ask him right now, would you make it $200 billion? He can actually, but he can afford to do that. He can do that.
SON: Well, my promise is $100 billion, but he is now asking to do more. I think with your leadership, my partnership with you, with your support, I will try to make it happen.
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TRUMP: My pleasure.
SON: All right.
TRUMP: $200 billion. He will make it happen. $200 billion is best.
SON: He is a great negotiator.
TRUMP: He is a brilliant guy and an unbelievable job, and the people of Japan and all over the world are very proud of him. They have a tremendous respect for him. So, when he does what he just did, and I would be surprised if it didn't go to $200 billion. When you say you'll try, I know you'll do it.
SON: I will really try. And I need your support, though.
TRUMP: You'll have my support --
SON: All right.
TRUMP: -- and our country's support.
SON: Oh, fantastic.
TRUMP: Thank you, Masa, very much.
SON: Fantastic.
TRUMP: I appreciate it.
SON: Thank you. Thank you.
TRUMP: (Inaudible) to the people of Japan who are all watching?
SON: Well, I'm sure our people in Japan are proud to make the partnership of U.S. and Japan be stronger, and I'm very excited to make this happen. Thank you very much.
TRUMP: Thank you, Masa.
SON: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
TRUMP: Good job.
SON: Thank you.
TRUMP: It's amazing. He is a great gentleman, a great leader and a great investor. So, to have that offer made, and we have so many companies coming in now that we will be announcing, or that will announce themselves. We're not to be with them to do it, but they'll be announcing. And as I said, small business optimism took a 41-point jump, 41 points. It went up 41 points. That's unheard of, and that's the biggest, they think, in recorded history. But, they know at least a minimum of 39 years. So, that's great.
But, on behalf of the American people, I want to thank Masa for his faith in what's happening with our country and what's happening with the world. There is a whole light over the entire world. Many people, some reporters, in speaking to him, they said, it actually is true. A couple of them are not necessarily friends of mine, but they said it is actually true that there is a light shining over the world. We are trying to help very strongly in getting the hostages back, as you know, with Israel and the Middle East. We are working very much on that. We are trying to get the war stopped, that horrible, horrible war that is going on in Ukraine, with Russia, Ukraine.
We are going to -- we've got a little progress. It's a tough one. It's a nasty one. It's nasty. People are being killed at levels that nobody has ever seen. It's very level fields, and the only thing that stops a bullet is a body, a human body. And the number of soldiers that are being killed on both sides is astronomical. I've never seen anything like it. And rapidly, I get reports every week, and it's not even -- it's like just they're going down. Nobody has seen anything like it. It's a very flat surface, a very flat land. That's why it's great farming land. It's the bread basket for the world, actually. But, it's very flat, and there is nothing to stop a bullet but a body. There is no protection, no, nothing. And it's -- what's happening there is far worse than people are reporting for both sides.
So, we're going to do our best and we've been doing our best, and we'll see what happens. But, since the election, I've been working every day to put the world at ease a little bit, to get rid of the wars. We had no wars when I left office, and now it's -- the whole world is blowing up. But, there is great optimism, and you saw that by SoftBank. Starting on day one, we'll implement a rapid series of bold reforms to restore our nation to full prosperity. We're going to go full prosperity and to build the greatest economy the world has ever seen, just as we had just a short time ago. We had it in my term. We had the greatest economy that the world had seen. We were blowing
away everybody. Our country was doubling up on China, doubling up on everybody, and everybody knows it. And then we had to slow it down with COVID, unfortunately at the end. But, even then, I gave it back with a substantial increase of the stock market, bigger than it was pre-COVID. So, it was pretty amazing.
Already, preparations are underway to slash massive numbers of job killing regulations, eliminating 10 old regulations for every new one. You put a new regulation on, you have to get rid of 10, and we'll be able to do it, and that was about the percentage we had. We cut more regulations than any President has ever cut by far, actually, by approximately five times. Some of those regulations, unfortunately, were put back on, but we'll catch up very quickly. We'll catch up with it.
One of the things I'd like to ask the Biden administration, as you probably heard, there are two events that took place. We're talking about a friendly takeover, a friendly transition, as they like to say.
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This is a friendly transition, and it is. But, there are two events that took place that I think are very terrible. One is that if people don't come back to work, come back into the office, they're going to be dismissed. And somebody in the Biden administration gave a five- year waiver of that, so that for five years, people don't have to come back into the office. It involved 49,000 people. For five years, they don't have to go. They just signed this thing. It's ridiculous. So, it was like a gift to a union, and we're going to obviously be in court to stop.
But, the other thing is really terrible. We spent a tremendous amount of money on building the wall. The wall was designed specifically by the Border Patrol, because it's very hard to climb. They need to have see-through. They needed to be steel because you can't cut. It's very powerful steel. It's very hard steel. It's a special type of steel, but very, very hard to cut. Inside the steel, as you know, we pour concrete, and that's a grade 10 concrete, which is a very strong concrete, very -- as though you were building about a 60-storey building. It's very powerful concrete. They've made tremendous technology advances in the word concrete. Who would think that? But, I know that from the construction industry. Today, what you can do with concrete is incredible.
So, we have a very strong concrete, and then we have a rebar. We put rebar inside the concrete, and the rebar, likewise, is very hard to cut. So, it's a very expensive process, very expensive wall, and then we put an anti-climb plate on the top. You saw that, and I didn't like the look of it. But then, when I watched, we had people testing, we had mountain climbers actually testing, and they were not able to get over the anti-climb plate. So, I said, all right, I guess we're going to put it on that plate on top, which I never loved the look of it, but it worked so unbelievably. Well, you have to do it.
So, we spent a lot of money on building it, and we have hundreds of miles that we put up. A lot of people don't realize, but we did 571 miles of wall. That's why we had such good records, in addition to the fact that Mexico helped us with their military. They kept people out, and they were actually very good under the past leader.
But now, we had -- we ordered an additional 200 miles of wall. It's very expensive, and now it's about double the price of what it would have been six years ago, and the administration is trying to sell it for five cents on the dollar, knowing that we're getting ready to put it up. And what they're doing is really an act. It's almost a criminal act. They know we're going to use it, and if we don't have it, we're going to have to rebuild it, and it'll cost double what it cost years ago, and that's hundreds of millions of dollars, because you're talking about a lot of wall.
I built much more than I said I was going to build. But then, after it was built, I said, we can do some more, because it's sort of, like water, people flow through, and that will pretty much really take care of it. And what happened is they just -- as you see, they're trying to sell it for five cents on the dollar. And that's really -- that has nothing to do with a smooth transition. That has to do with people really trying to stop our nation. And all it means really is that we're going to spend hundreds of millions of dollars more. I'm not even talking about the time. Time would be pretty long, but we'll spend hundreds of millions of dollars more on building the same wall that we already have.
And people have already come back to us that have deals at five cents and four cents, and one guy at three cents on the dollar, and they offered to sell it back to us at more money than it costs us to build substantially. Can you believe it? So, they make a deal with the United States to buy it for pennies, and then they call us and they say, do you want to buy --
HILL: You've been listening to President Trump here speaking at Mar-a- Lago. We had been taking some of the President-elect's remarks, because we were told there would be some Q&A. He has been going on a little bit about the wall, not all fact-based there. We're going to -- our Daniel Dale is following that. We're going to bring you some of that ahead.
But, I also want to dig into a little bit of what we heard from the President-elect and from the CEO of SoftBank, Masa Son, about this investment coming into the U.S. Margaret Talev back with us now, of course, senior contributor for Axios, and also the Director of the Democracy, Journalism, and Citizenship Institute at Syracuse University.
Margaret, as we look at this, I was struck by some of these comments, right? So, the President-elect talking about this $100 billion investment, which is also set to create some 100,000 jobs in the United States, saying it was a very productive meeting, he is optimistic, and that so many are optimistic about the U.S. since the election, and then the comments that we heard from the CEO of SoftBank really echoing that, talking about how excited he is to work with the President, and the President-elect even haggling a little bit to get him to double the investment in real time. [11:30:00]
It was something.
TALEV: Yeah. It was definitely something. I think it's a good way to put it. And -- no, we didn't hear the CEO make that commitment, although he did talk about the word double. He talked about the phrase doubling down and about his confidence level, and of course, he is talking about in 2016, just before Donald Trump came into office for the first time, the same CEO made a commitment for an investment of about half that size and ended up putting in a little bit more. So, this time he said he is going to double down. And Trump said, why don't you double down on that? And he said, well, I'll try. I'll see what I can do.
It was interesting, there was another part where he told the President-elect that he needed his support, and Trump said to him, you'll have my support. So, what does all of this mean? Where is all of this going? You'll recall, of course, that it was last week that the President-elect said he made a promise that anyone who invests a billion dollars or more in the U.S. will receive fully expedited approvals and permits, he said, including environmental approvals. What does that mean? What could the scope of that be? To be determined. But, he is in let's make a deal mode. And the SoftBank CEO also was in let's make a deal mode, and wants the good press.
There are some complicating factors here, though, that I think are worth watching. We expect this investment to be in AI, right, in AI technology, AI infrastructure. The long term or the near-term impacts of AI, of course, are estimated to be to cost tens of millions of jobs because of the efficiencies or redundancies, the automation that they would create. Many of those jobs could be unskilled jobs. Some of those jobs could be skilled jobs. So, AI is going to, over time, create a lot of efficiencies in the workplace. But, what's going to happen to those people whose jobs are displaced? So, the creation of 100,000 jobs, if that were to come to fruition after an investment of $100 billion, could end up being offset by the elimination of a lot of jobs. So, that's one thing I think we need to ask.
And another is, where is SoftBank going to actually get the cash influx? They have this venture capital fund. It's made investments in companies like Nvidia, Alibaba, Uber, DoorDash over the years. It's also had some major high-profile losses. So, do they have the cash? Where will they have the cash to front that $100 billion, and where will these investments actually be made in the U.S.? A lot we don't know, but for Trump, who is trying to build up steam and show that people want to invest in the U.S., this is certainly, at least at this moment, a good news announcement.
HILL: Yeah. Absolutely such important points, and in terms of that public support, so much of what we have seen recently as well, we know that does fuel the President-elect.
Margaret Talev, always appreciate it. Thank you.
TALEV: Thanks so much. HILL: And stay with us. We'll be right back. You're watching CNN
Newsroom.
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HILL: Turning now to the first public statement attributed to outside Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad since the collapse of his regime, in a message posted on Telegram, Assad said his abrupt departure to Russia was unplanned, and at no point did he consider stepping down or seeking refuge, saying he left Syria only after Damascus had fallen to rebels, noting the country is now, in his words, "in the hands (ph) of terrorists". But, it is unclear, again, whether Assad actually controls that Telegram account right now.
Senior International Correspondent Frederik Pleitgen is following more of the developments for us from Moscow.
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FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: And all this was posted on a Telegram channel, what used to be the official Telegram channel of the Syrian presidency, that has actually been disabled for a while, but has now gone back online, and that's where that statement was posted. So, we do have to caveat that this is allegedly by Bashar al-Assad. We're not really sure if it's him who is behind it, but it is on what used to be the official Telegram channel of the Syrian President.
First of all, one of the things that's really interesting about it is that the dateline that's given is Moscow, indicating that possibly Bashar al-Assad is still here in Moscow. He has, of course, been given asylum by the Russians. But then, of course, the details are very interesting, because he does go into detail as to what exactly happened on December 8th, when the Assad regime collapsed. He says that until the early morning hours of December 8th that he was still in Damascus and doing his duties, as he put it, until it became clear that the situation became untenable.
I want to read you a little quote, because I do think it's fascinating to hear what he writes. He says, quote, "As terrorist forces infiltrated Damascus, I moved to Latakia", which is, of course, the coastal area of Syria, and really the heartland of the support for Bashar al-Assad, or was for a very long time, "in coordination with our Russian allies to oversee combat operations", he says. And then he says, "Upon arrival at the Hmeimim airbase, that is the Russian airbase near Latakia, it became clear that our forces had completely withdrawn from all the battle lines and that the last army positions had fallen, in other words, that that situation had become untenable."
He then says that the Russian base itself came under attack, and that it was then the Russians who made the decision to conduct an emergency evacuation of Bashar al-Assad and some of his closest confidents and members of his family to Moscow that it was not his decision. The Russians, of course, had said that it was actually Bashar al-Assad himself who had decided to cede power and indicate there was a transfer of power, and that the decision was not made by the Russians. He is now apparently saying something different here. There is another interesting quote that he put out as well. He said, "At no point during these events did I consider stepping down or seeking refuge, nor was such a proposal made by any individual party."
So, we're getting some interesting takes from Bashar al-Assad. He says he still feels connected to his Syrian homeland. Of course, absolutely unclear where he is here in Russia, but definitely an interesting take about how things apparently went down, from his perspective. At the same time, he does say at the end of the statement, he says "When the state falls into the hands of terrorism, and the ability to make meaningful contribution is lost, any position becomes void of purpose, rendering its occupation meaningless." This seemingly is Bashar al- Assad saying that he understands that the Syrian Arab Republic is no more and the Assad dynasty is no more either.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HILL: And our thanks to Fred Pleitgen there.
Well, after the fall of Assad's regime, Israeli forces took control of a buffer zone that had separated Israeli and Syrian forces for decades. Now, the Israeli government has approved a plan to expand settlements in the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau in southwestern Syria that Israel has occupied for nearly 60 years, a move that is drawing condemnation from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, who consider the action a violation of international law and warn that it could derail Syria's chances of restoring stability.
Still to come here this hour, a major storm hitting the French territory of Mayotte. We will have the latest on that.
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[11:40:00]
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HILL: Welcome back. You're watching CNN Newsroom. I'm Erica Hill in New York.
Moments ago, my colleague Pamela Brown spoke with CNN's Daniel Dale to fact-check some of what we just heard from President-elect Trump. Let's take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DANIEL DALE, CNN PRODUCER: False claims we've heard before. He repeated his frequent claim that there were no wars when he left office, clearly not true. One research group said there were about 50 active armed conflicts at the time. U.S. troops are still deployed on combat missions in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria. We had ongoing civil wars in Syria, Somalia, Yemen, unresolved Israeli-Palestinian conflict, various insurgencies in other places in Africa, clearly not true. He said again, as he has before, that he built more wall than he said he was going to. Well, on that 2016 campaign, he repeatedly said he built about a thousand miles. The actual total, according to official federal statistics, was 458 miles. And again, he claimed here it was 571. No, it was 458, and critically, that includes more than 300 miles of replacement barrier. So, only about 60 of those miles were new primary barriers in places no barriers had existed before.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HILL: Our thanks to Daniel Dale for that fact-check.
Donald Trump is taking questions now. So, let's listen in.
TRUMP: All right. I'll be honest. Yes.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you entertaining the idea of pre-emptive strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities?
TRUMP: Against who?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Against Iran's nuclear facilities.
TRUMP: Well, I can't tell you that. I mean, it's a wonderful question. But, how can I? Am I going to do pre-emptive strikes? Why would I say that? Can you imagine? If I said yes or no, you'd say that was strange that he answered that way. Am I going to do pre-emptive strikes on Iran? Is that a serious question? How could I answer a question like that?
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: Say it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Would be in support of Israeli strikes on Iran?
TRUMP: How could I tell you a thing like that? No. It's just -- so, you don't talk about that before something may or may not happen. Just --
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: I don't want to insult you. I just think it's just not something that I would ever answer, having to do with there or any other places.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- Time magazine interview. And I ask just clearly, do you believe there is a connection between vaccines and autism? Do you believe there is a --
TRUMP: Well, I don't. Look, right now, you have some very brilliant people looking at it. I had dinner the other night with the head of Pfizer, the head of Eli Lilly and RFK, as you know, and Oz, and we had -- and other people within the administration that are involved, the medical, and we're looking to find out. If you look at autism, so, 30 years ago, we had -- I've heard numbers of like one in 200,000, one in 100,000, and now I'm hearing numbers of one in 100. So, something is wrong. There is something wrong, and we're going to find out about it.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can I follow up on Robert Kennedy? He is on the Hill today. He is meeting with senators. What do you say to people who are worried that his views on vaccines will translate into policies that will make their kids less safe?
TRUMP: No. I think he is going to be much less radical than you would think. I think he has got a very open mind, or I wouldn't have put him there. He is going to be very much less radical. But, there are problems. I mean, we don't do as well as a lot of other nations, and those nations use nothing, and we're going to find out what those problems are.
[11:45:00]
And another thing that came up at the dinner was fascinating, because I had Bobby and I had, again, the head of Pfizer. You know who that is. He is a highly respected man who has run an incredible company, likewise, with Lily, the top two people, and we had the head of the industry also. So, all companies were represented. And I said, let's have it out now a little bit. And you know what came out of that meeting is that we're paying far too much, because we're paying much more than other countries, and we have laws that make it impossible to reduce. And we have a thing called the middle man. You know the middle man, right? The horrible middle man that makes more money, frankly, than the drug companies. And they don't do anything except they're a middle man. We're going to knock out the middle man.
I'm going to be very unpopular after that statement.
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: I don't know who these middle men are, but they are rich as hell. And we're going to knock out the middle man. We're going to get drug costs down at levels that nobody has ever seen before. And that really, I tell you, we spent more time talking about that with Bobby and with the executives and OZ, all of them. We spent more time talking about that than anything else.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President Trump, what about the polio vaccine?
TRUMP: Well, I'm a big believer in it, and I think everything should be looked at, but I'm a big believer in the polio vaccine --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you think --
TRUMP: -- the Salk vaccine.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: -- do you think schools should mandate vaccines? Do you think schools should mandate vaccines?
TRUMP: I don't like mandates. I'm not a big mandate person. So, I was against mandates. Mostly Democrat governors did the mandates. And they did a very poor thing. It was -- retrospect, they made a big mistake having to do with the education of children. Yeah, they lost, like, a year or two years of their lives. The mandate was a bad thing. I was against the mandate.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is that something you wanted?
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: Yes, please.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you expect Ron DeSantis to appoint Lara Trump to Senator Marco Rubio's seat?
TRUMP: No, I don't -- I probably don't, but I don't know. Ron is doing a good job. That's his choice. Nothing to do with me. Lara is unbelievable. I mean, she was incredible, the job she did at the RNC as chairman, along with Michael Whatley, the combination. But, I can just speak for Lara. It's -- she is so highly respected by women. I mean, even her workout routines are through the roof. She lifts 150 pounds. I don't know how the hell she does it. She is a bad example for men and women sport, because I wouldn't be able to beat her. I don't believe. I'd try like hell. But, no, she is an incredible woman.
And it's funny, people oftentimes talk about nepotism. I never had -- when I put her there, people said, how did you get her to do it? She could have run for the Senate in North Carolina. Ted Budd would be the first to say, and he wouldn't have run. Nobody would have run. And she just said, no, I want to really focus on my children. When the election and my family, she has a great family, when the election started getting closer, I asked her, would she go to Washington and work on the chairman of the committee, along with Michael Whatley, and they did such an unbelievable job, especially on cheating. They stopped it, or at least they stymied it, too big to rig, and we won in a landslide. We won tremendously. She did an amazing job.
Now, Ron is going to have to make because Marco is -- has been really a star already, and we haven't started. But, we see signs of -- from some people, or very early, we see signs of start. I mean, Marco has done incredibly. He is sort of born for it. It was such an easy decision. The Marco decision was such an easy but he leaves a vacancy in Florida, and Ron is going to have to make that decision, and he'll make the right decision.
I also know that Lara has got so many other things. I mean, she has got so many other things. People want her to be on television. They want to give her contracts. Her predominant thought is our country and her family. Those are her thoughts. But, she has got so many other things that she is talking about.
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: He'll make the right decision.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, Senators who oppose your nominees, your cabinet nominees, should they be primaried?
TRUMP: If they are unreasonable -- I'll give you a different answer, an answer that you'll be shocked to hear. If they're unreasonable, if they're opposing somebody for political reasons or stupid reasons, I would say it has nothing to do with me. I would say they probably would be primaried. But, if they're reasonable, fair and really disagree with something or somebody, I could see that happening.
[11:50:00]
But, I do believe that if they are unreal -- I think we have great people. I think we have a great group of people. Pam has been unbelievably received. You take a look, Pam Bondi. So many have been just unbelievably received. I think Pete Hegseth is making tremendous strides over the last week. He is going to be great. Look, he went to Princeton. He went to Harvard. He was a great student there, but he really was -- from the first day I met him, all he wanted to talk about was military. He is just a military guy. I think it's a natural. This was my idea. And Pete Hegseth gave up a lot because he was going big places in Fox, big, big places, lot of money.
And he didn't even hesitate when I said, do you want to do this? He said, absolutely. I said, if it doesn't work out, you will never have the opportunity that you have right now in terms of the world of entertainment or business, whatever you want to call it. You'll never have that opportunity again. In fact, it could be just the opposite, because it's nasty out there. He said, I don't care. I have to do it for my country. He gave up a tremendous amount -- this certain work, it would be a tragedy, because -- but that's what he loves. He loves the military. I never talked to him about anything else. He'd talk about the military. He had come to see me about a soldier that was unfairly treated, and could I help? That's the only thing I virtually ever talked to him about.
And I always remembered it. I've seen him many times, and I don't think I've ever had a subject on anything other than military with him. That's where his love is. And he didn't say, well, I'd like to think about it. I'd like to talk to my family. He said, not even a contest. And he was going through the roof over there. He was doing great. They have the number one show that Saturday and Sunday with Will and Rachel. That's -- that was great chemistry. And if this didn't work out for him, it would be actually sort of tragic. Yeah.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Would you consider pardoning Eric Adams?
TRUMP: Yeah, I would. Yeah. I think that he was treated pretty unfairly. Now, I haven't seen the gravity of it all, but it seems like being upgraded in an airplane many years ago. I know probably everybody here has been upgraded. They see you're all stars, and they say, I want to upgrade that person from NBC. I'm going to upgrade him, and that would mean you'll spend the rest of your life in prison. I don't know. Somehow I would -- I mean, I'd have to see it, because I don't know the facts. I think he was treated.
It's very interesting when he essentially went against what was happening with the migrants coming in. And he made some pretty strong statements, like, this is not sustainable. I said, you know what? He'll be indicted soon. And I said it not as a prediction, a little bit light heartedly, but I said it. I said he is going to be indicted, and a few months later, he got indicted. So, I would certainly look at it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, can I ask a question about the drones?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (Inaudible) in Syria. Are you planning on pulling them into (inaudible)? Or would you --
TRUMP: Well, we had 5,000 troops along the border, and I asked a couple of generals. So, we have an army of 250,000 in Syria, and you had an army of 400,000. They have many more people than that. Turkey is a major force, by the way, and Erdogan is somebody I got along with great but he has a major military force. And his has not been worn out with war. It hasn't been worn out with all of the other -- I mean, he has built a very strong, powerful army. And so, we have 5,000 soldiers, in between a five million person army and a 250,000 person army. And I asked the general, what do you think of that situation? He said, they'll be just -- they'll be wiped out immediately. And I moved them out because -- and I took a lot of heat. And you know what happened? Nothing, nothing. I saved a lot of lives.
Now we have 900. They put some back, but 900 -- if you're talking about two -- now, one of the sides has been essentially wiped out. But, nobody knows who the other side is. But, I do. You know who it is? Turkey. OK? Turkey is the one behind it. He is a very smart guy. They've wanted it for thousands of years, and he got it, and those people that went in are controlled by Turkey, and that's OK. It's another way to fight.
But, no. I don't think that I want to have our soldiers killed. But, I don't think that will happen now anyway, because the one side has been decimated.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, I want to ask you a question about the drones.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (Inaudible).
TRUMP: Well, nobody knows what the final outcome is going to be in the region. Nobody knows who really the final. I believe it is Turkey, and I think Turkey is very smart.
[11:55:00]
He is a very smart guy, and he is very tough, but Turkey did an unfriendly takeover without a lot of lives being lost.
I can say that Assad was a butcher. Hear what he did to children. You remember, I attacked him with the 58 missiles, unbelievable, missiles coming from ships 700 miles away, and every one of them hit their target, but I did that. That was the red line in the sand. Obama drew it, and then he refused to honor what he did. He said, if anybody goes across the red line, and Assad killed many more children after that, and Obama did nothing, but I did. I hit him with a lot of missiles. In fact, President Xi was sitting here the night. He was in that dining room having chocolate cake. You remember the famous chocolate cake? But -- and that's when I explained what we were doing, as the missiles were shot, and it was amazing as to precision, because every one of those missiles hit its target from a long distance away.
Had President Obama drawn the line and where it meant something, you wouldn't have even had Russia there. But, in the end, I never understood why Russia went there. They were not getting very much out of it, but now their time is taken up with Ukraine, and we'd like to get them to stop on Ukraine, and Ukraine stop also.
As you know, when I went to the Cathedral, which is fantastic, the job that they've done in France, and the job that Macron, Emmanuel did, he did a phenomenal job on the rebuilding of that Cathedral. It's magnificent, and they did a great thing, and they had great respect for our country. They treated me, meaning, I'm the country. I'm the representative of our country, and we were treated with great respect.
And one of the people that came to pay his respects is, as you know, Ukraine, Zelenskyy, and he would like to have peace. He wants peace. Everyone is being killed. It's the worst carnage that this world has seen since World War II. I've had pictures of fields where bodies are lying on top of bodies. It looks like the old pictures of the Civil War, where just bodies are all over. Just if you saw those pictures, you'd feel more strongly about it. It's got to stop. And we're trying, and we're trying to get --
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: Well, we're going to see. We're going to be talking -- we'll be talking to President Putin, and we'll be talking to the representative Zelenskyy and representatives from Ukraine, we got to stop it. It's carnage.
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: Thank you. Good to see you. Good to see you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you comment on the drones that are flying around New Jersey ports? And it seems like the American people have a big --
TRUMP: The government knows what is happening. Look, our military knows where they took off from. If it's a garage, they can go right into that garage. They know where it came from and where it went. And for some reason, they don't want to comment. And I think they'd be better off saying what it is. Our military knows, and our President knows, and for some reason, they want to keep people in suspense. I can't imagine it's the enemy, because it was the enemy that blasted out. Even if they were late, they'd blast it. Something strange is going on. For some reason, they don't want to tell the people, and they should, because the people are really -- I mean, they happen to be over Bedminster.
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: They're very close to Bedminster. I think maybe I won't spend the weekend in Bedminster. I decided to cancel my trip.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Have you received an intelligence briefing on the drones?
TRUMP: I don't want to comment on that.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Have you been --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have any reason to think they are a threat?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Two quick questions. First, on vaccines, do you want RFK Jr. to revoke any vaccines?
TRUMP: No. I want him to come back with a report as to what he thinks. We're going to find out a lot. We're doing two things. We're going to have tremendous cost savings will come out of this. That's a minimum. And we're also going to have, and I think, very serious discussions about certain things, whether it's pesticides. Europe doesn't use pesticides, and yet they have a better mortality rate than we do. They don't use pesticides. In fact, they use it as an excuse not to take our farm product. We spend billions and billions of dollars on pesticides, and something bad is happening. Again, you take a look at autism today versus 20, 25 years ago, it's like not even believable.
So, we're going to have reports. No. Nothing is going to happen very quickly. I think you're going to find that Bobby is much -- he is a very rational guy. I found him to be very rational. No, nothing. You're not going to lose the polio vaccine. It's not going to happen. I saw what happened with the polio. I have friends that were very much affected by that. I have friends for many years --
