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Smartphones and Computers Now Exempt From Trump's Latest Tariffs; Economic Standoff Between U.S. And China Worries Taiwan; Iran State Media: Atmosphere In Nuclear Talks Was "Positive"; Judge Says Student Activist Mahmoud Khalil Can Be Deported; Supreme Court: Trump Administration Must "Facilitate" Return Of Kilmar Abrego Garcia From El Salvador. No Preliminary Cause Yet In Deadly Helicopter Crash; RFK Jr. Claims New Research Will Find "Autism Epidemic" Cause By Sept.; Season Finale Of "United States Of Scandal" Sunday At 9PM. Aired 12-1p ET

Aired April 12, 2025 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00]

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN ANCHOR: -- the iconic final line of the story. "So we beat on, boats against the current, born back ceaselessly into the past."

That's all we have time for. Don't forget, you can find all our shows online as podcasts at CNN.com/audio and on all other major platforms.

I'm Christiane Amanpour in London. Thanks for watching and see you again next week.

ISABAEL ROSALES, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, and thank you for joining me. I'm Isabel Rosales in for Fredricka Whitfield.

We start with breaking news in President Trump's ongoing global trade war. The U.S. is now exempting some of the most popular goods imported to the U.S. from the President's sweeping tariffs.

In a notice from the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, electronics, including smartphones and computers, are now excluded from the tariffs. Those items are among the most heavily imported from China, even as the two nations entrenched themselves in a tariff standoff.

The Trump administration hitting China on Wednesday with a whopping 145 percent tariff on its exports to the U.S. China retaliating with a 125 percent tariff on U.S. goods.

CNN's Kevin Liptak is in West Palm Beach, Florida, near where President Trump is spending his weekend. Kevin, how did the White House decide to exempt these popular products?

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Well, it's a good question and it's not one that we have an answer to at this hour. The White House hasn't come out to explain exactly what the President's decision-making was here. And this notice that appeared on the official government register didn't show up until very late last night. And so in a lot of ways, companies are still digesting some of this information. But you know, after so much ratcheting up of those tariffs over the past week, this is the first sign of any kind of easing, particularly when it comes to China, because almost all of the products that are now exempted from some of these tariffs are products that are manufactured in China.

Includes smartphones, laptop computers, transistors, flat panel monitors, hard drives, semiconductors, all products that are, for the most part, not manufactured in the United States. And what this could mean is that American consumers could be spared some of the higher prices that would be facing those items if the 145 percent tariff on China were to go into effect.

It could also be a major boon for certain companies. I'm thinking like Apple, like Samsung, companies that produce the bulk of their products in China. And so this really does kind of punctuate what has been a whipsaw week for the President when it comes to these tariffs.

He had that Liberation Day announcement. He reversed some of the tariffs, he ratcheted up the tariffs on China, but now we're hearing that many of the products that the U.S. imports from that country could now be spared.

And I think it all lends to the sense, one, of uncertainty when it comes to the President's tariff policy. You know, we've been hearing for weeks that exemptions would not be included in this, but also the idea that there could now be flexibility included in what the President is doing.

So this is something that we will learn much more about in the coming hours, but it is quite a significant development, Isabel.

ROSALES: Yes, it's been a couple of days of essentially a game of chicken of who will blink first, and we may be getting our answer right here.

Kevin Liptak, thank you.

President Trump's tariffs aren't just impacting international diplomacy. The wallets of American consumers are also expected to take a direct hit. A recent report from Yale University's Budget Lab estimates that tariffs will cost the average middle-class U.S. household at least $3,700 a year.

Joining us to discuss what to do about your personal finances during this time of economic uncertainty is Michele Singletary. She's the Washington Post personal finance columnist. Michele, boy, we want to hear from you.

So we just learned that these electronics like smartphones, computers, they are now exempt from the latest tariffs round. Economists have warned that the cost of tariffs may ultimately be passed along to the consumer. So how big of a deal is this? MICHELE SINGLETARY, SYNDICATED PERSONAL FINANCE COLUMNIST, WASHINGTON POST: I think it's a big deal for people who are in a market for smartphones and computers and things like that. But let's not forget that these tariffs are still on the board for a lot of consumer goods, furniture, clothes, a lot of the things that we have in our homes.

So we are not out of the woods. This benefits the President's billionaire buddies, but it doesn't benefit the regular American public that much. I mean, think about it. I've got an iPhone, love it. I will just keep the one I have if it went up, you know, 100 percent.

[12:05:01]

And so, but there's some items that people can't pull away from. They have to buy it, right? You know, clothes for your kids, shoes for your kids. And so I'm very concerned still about what's happening as it regards to tariffs and how it's going to impact regular people's pocketbooks.

ROSALES: Right. So we're not out of the woods yet. Not the moment to take a sigh of relief. Well, all of this comes as U.S. consumer confidence plunged this month by 11 percent to its second lowest level ever, going back to records of 1952. That's according to the latest University of Michigan monthly survey.

That is lower, Michele, than anything during the Great Depression and second only to COVID times. What does a souring sentiment mean for consumer spending?

SINGLETARY: So you know that our economy is driven by consumption and people are worried rightfully so this time. You know, even if you don't have money in the stock market, if people who do pull back because their portfolios are down, that means they're not shopping. They're not going out to eat. They're delaying major purchases. And they should.

If you are living paycheck to paycheck or you are just squeaking by for some things, you should be pulling back because we could be headed for a recession and that could mean your job. And that means you need to stockpile cash, not paper towels.

And that is what is concerning to people who understand that they are being impacted by these policies that keep flip-flopping. How do you budget when you don't know what really is going to happen tomorrow or next week?

ROSALES: Well, I'm hoping you can answer that same question. You shared this advice. If you can cut, cut. Cut to the bone until you see the white meat. So where do folks begin making those cuts? And what does that mean? How deep are we actually talking here?

SINGLETARY: Yes, I'm talking totally deep. So, you know, eating out. And, you know, I see a lot of people's budgets. So I see what people are spending on. And, you know, that's OK.

You know, when you've got money coming in, you treat yourself. So eating out, I think you're going to see a lot of reduction in that. Really vacation. You know, listen, if I were a federal worker or I was a contractor or I serve that population, I have -- there are so many non-profits that are being impacted by that.

I would be pulling back. I would be canceling that beach vacation. I'm going to be really cautious about spending right now and pull back as much as you can. Cut where you can cut and put that money to the side so that if there is a disruption in your income or you maybe don't get those overtime hours that you're used to, you'll have some cash to weather this storm.

It takes a lot longer to get a job once you lose a job. And you may have to live off those savings for several months.

ROSALES: Yes. And Yale Labs found that consumers face an overall effective tariff rate of 27 percent. That is the highest since 1903. So for people that are just about to retire or those that have just retired, they're seeing these retirement accounts going up and down, dwindling by the day and they don't have time to ride this thing out. What do you tell them?

SINGLETARY: Well, you know, and I am not going to tell you not to panic. I've been saying it quite a lot. And I want to say that because I am you. I am the first in my generation to be in the stock market.

And so when you see these kinds of drops in such a short period of time, you should scream, you should punch a pillow. I mean, my gosh. But I caution you to act on that. So even if you're in retirement, especially if you're at the beginning of your retirement, you still have time.

You still have time to see this market, you know, return to the normal up and down that it usually has. And so you're not going to be pulling out all of your money at one time. So if you had to say a withdrawal rate of like 4 percent or 3 percent this year, see if you can pull it back to 2 percent and live off of, you know, whatever other fixed income you might have or your savings.

Now, if you're like me and I put money in my emergency fund, I don't want to take it out, but guess what you all? This is an emergency. So tap that before you pull money out.

And my husband and I were planning to redo our bathroom. It was a want, not a need. We're pulling back on that. We're going to pause because now all the materials that we were going to do that is more expensive. And so that's what happens.

And what does that do? That means that that person that I was going to hire to do my bathroom, the companies that were going to produce the stuff to go in it, that impacts them. But you got to do what you have to do to make sure you secure your own finances in this kind of time when we have these policies that just don't make any sense.

ROSALES: Hey, from the financial expert herself, time to pump the brakes here and pull back.

Michele Singletary, I really appreciate your time. Thank you.

SINGLETARY: Thank you.

ROSALES: Thanks.

[12:10:00]

Well, tariffs, retaliation, and a lack of dialogue are not only raising tensions between the U.S. and China, the standoff is also worrying some in Taiwan. CNN's Will Ripley has more from Taipei.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

WILL RIPLEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): On China's tightly controlled social media, censors are letting nationalist voices grow louder. If China can keep the 125 percent tariff for three months, then we won't have any issues taking back Taiwan.

Since China and the U.S. have already severed economic and trade relations, why not take this opportunity to recover Taiwan? We need a civil war to divert attention. Recovering Taiwan cannot be delayed any longer.

JIA WEN-JI, FORMER TAIWANESE DIPLOMAT, TV INFLUENCER (through translation): At this time, China is confronting the United States and has seized the best opportunity.

RIPLEY (voice-over): Nationalist influencers are framing democratic, self-governing Taiwan as leverage, even though China's communist leaders have never controlled it. Fuel for China's escalating trade war with the U.S. And China feels emboldened.

Its top electric vehicle maker, BYD, is now outselling Tesla and doesn't even bother selling passenger cars to the U.S., a sign Beijing doesn't fear economic isolation. Some in China even see this trade war as a dress rehearsal, testing how resilient the country's economy might be if there ever were a real war for Taiwan.

YUAN JUZHENG, PROFESSOR, NATIONAL TAIWAN UNIVERSITY (through translation): China is united from top to bottom. Politically speaking, this system is very superior.

RIPLEY (voice-over): This week, China's foreign ministry posted a quote from former Chinese leader Mao Zedong from the Korean War era, the last time China and the U.S. clashed directly on the battlefield.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Speaking in Foreign Language)

RIPLEY (voice-over): Back then, Mao made his position clear -- China would not bend to American pressure. Today, Chinese President Xi Jinping also wants to project strength to Washington and his own people. For Beijing, this isn't just about pride. It's about power. And Taiwan's chip industry may be the prize.

RIPLEY: Behind these walls, some of the world's most advanced, highly secretive technology. It's so secret, you have to check your phone, your laptop, anything that emits a signal just to walk through the door.

RIPLEY (voice-over): I visited Taiwan's semiconductor manufacturing company last year. TSMC makes most of the world's advanced microchips.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: As you know, Taiwan pretty much has a monopoly on that market.

RIPLEY (voice-over): Last month, TSMC announced a $165 billion U.S. investment, a political win for U.S. President Donald Trump, but in Taiwan, it triggered alarm for some.

TAMMY CHAO, RETIREE: Trump is flipping the whole world upside down. And TSMC is Taiwan's treasure. I don't feel it's safe. He's a businessman. So, he'll deal Taiwan.

RIPLEY (voice-over): Right now, both leaders are playing hardball. Trump says he's ready to talk, but only if Xi makes the first move. But Beijing reacts differently. No call initiated, no compromise made. A dangerous standoff where protocol and pride are getting in the way of diplomacy.

And as the world's two biggest economies wait each other out, ordinary people here in Taiwan worry what might get traded away in a deal made by two powerful men, each too proud to pick up the phone.

Will Ripley, CNN, Taipei.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

ROSALES: Still ahead, the U.S. and Iran hold nuclear talks in the Middle East as President Trump threatens to take military action if a deal is not reached. We're live with the latest on those negotiations.

Plus, a judge rules that Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil, a legal permanent resident, can be deported. Up next, how his lawyers are responding.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:15:28]

ROSALES: This just in to CNN, nuclear talks between Iran and the U.S. have wrapped for the day. Iran's state media describing the talks as constructive. They also included the first direct contact between officials from the Trump administration and Iran.

Iran is saying these talks could lay the groundwork for full negotiations. Here was President Trump's take on Air Force One last night.

TRUMP: I want them not to have a nuclear weapon. I want Iran to be a wonderful, great happy country. But they can't have a nuclear weapon. I want them to flourish, but they can't have a nuclear weapon.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

ROSALES: CNN International Correspondent Salma Abdelaziz is with us now from London. Salma, how did these discussions play out today?

SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I think it's a very positive sign that we are already hearing that these delegations are going to meet again next weekend on Saturday. Oman's foreign minister, who was acting as the mediator in these talks, even saying that the two sides were very close to reaching a framework for negotiations.

But it's very important to note here that we are very early days into this. The talks lasted for about two and a half hours. Most of them were taking place in an indirect fashion with, again, Oman's foreign minister shuttling between Iran's delegation headed by Iran's foreign minister and the U.S. delegation, of course, headed by Steve Witkoff.

There was a portion of the meeting where they did meet face-to-face, Iran's foreign minister and Steve Witkoff. As you mentioned, that would make those the first direct meetings between Trump officials and Iran officials. So, again, yet there, another sign of progress.

[12:20:02]

And all of this began with President Trump saying that he wanted to reach a deal with Iran. But that overture came with a threat. President Trump has said he will carry out military strikes. He will take military action against Iran if a deal is not reached.

Iran has responded to that by saying it will not negotiate under duress, describing that as a red line. But there is room here to maneuver, despite, of course, President Trump wielding that stick. Steve Witkoff, again, the envoy, is wielding a carrot.

He is promising, potentially, to ease the sanctions on Iran and give it that economic breathing space that it very desperately needs. But, again, all of this is still in the very early stages. For both of these parties, it was about sussing each other out, seeing if there's any space, any room to even begin talks. And we now have that sign of progress that they will speak again next weekend.

ROSALES: OK, direct talks and very direct language from President Trump, who said there will be hell to pay if the regime doesn't agree to his demands.

Salma Abdelaziz, we'll see how this plays out. Thank you.

A Louisiana immigration judge has ruled a Columbia University graduate, Mahmoud Khalil, a legal, permanent resident, can be deported. Khalil was present at pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia last spring. The judge ordered the government to hand over evidence against Khalil that justified deporting him.

That evidence included a memo from Secretary of State Marco Rubio. It alleges Khalil has, quote, "beliefs, statements or associations that would compromise U.S. foreign policy interests". Khalil's lawyers call the judge's decision chilling and says that it sets a harmful precedent.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

BAHER AZMY, MEMBER OF MAHMOUD KHALIL'S LEGAL TEAM: It was really a shameful, disgraceful process. The whole thing felt like a show trial. The judge had her mind made up from the beginning, was extraordinarily hostile, didn't care about the Constitution, didn't care at all about legal process, didn't care at all about the validity or the quantity of evidence.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

ROSALES: We're joined by CNN Senior National Security Analyst Juliette Kayyem. She is also a former Assistant Secretary at the Department of Homeland Security. Juliette, thank you for being with us.

Let's begin with your reaction to this finding of removability. The judge essentially agreeing with the government saying that Khalil can be forced out of the country as a national security risk.

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: That's right. So she -- I mean, basically this is an immigration judge essentially owned by the administration. These are courts that are not independent, Article III courts. So I would have been surprised actually if there had been a ruling to the constitutionality or due process challenges that will be heard, no doubt in federal courts in the United States.

This is a interesting case in terms of its jurisdictional issue just because he was immediately removed from New York to Louisiana. There is a hold on deporting him out of the country to determine the constitutionality of what seems like a mere sort of statement by Secretary Rubio that he poses a threat to the United States and undermines our foreign policy.

Those big issues have not even been addressed. And I have to say, even the judge said, I'm not addressing those larger constitutional issues.

ROSALES: And Khalil, a legal U.S. resident, he is among the first of a string of students that we saw arrested under President Trump's promised crackdown on students who joined campus protests against the war in Gaza. Now in Khalil's case, he didn't have a student visa, but here's what Secretary of State Marco Rubio said about foreign students. Listen.

KAYYEM: Yes.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

MARCO RUBIO, SECRETARY OF STATE: If you come to this country as a student, we expect you to go to class and study and get a degree. If you come here to like vandalize a library, take over a campus and do all kinds of crazy things, you know, we're going to get rid of these people and we're going to continue to do it. So when we identify lunatics like these, we take away their student visa.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

ROSALES: What do you think of what he's saying there and his invoking of a rarely used statute overall to justify Khalil's deportation?

KAYYEM: So I think the issue of the deportation is one that really has to be based on what the Secretary of State found, because I want to take a step back. What we know is true now is that the administration is simply taking away student visas. A lot of these students appear to have no relation to protest or to incitement or to undermining the government. And we're now seeing it across the country.

I believe -- and this is happening at my university as well at Harvard, I think one of the things that we're seeing is the administration is under so much pressure to increase its deportation numbers. It's actually going after the low-hanging fruit, the students who have visas, people who have filed with the IRS as we're seeing.

[12:25:07]

These aren't mass deportation. These are, you know, these are the people who were most lawful as we're seeing. I'm not going to get in. We don't know the specifics of any particular individual, but we can no longer believe Secretary of State Marco Rubio about that this is just targeted against protesters where you might have an argument, right?

This is now we know gotten much bigger. And I think that's everyone's concern about the immigration efforts by the administration.

ROSALES: Yes. And to your point, it's more than 500 students, faculty, and researchers that have had their visas revoked so far, CNN has reported.

I want to pivot to the Maryland father who the Trump administration acknowledges it mistakenly deported to El Salvador. His name is Kilmar Abrego Garcia. Here's what President Trump just recently said on Air Force One about it.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How does the administration, how do you plan to respond to the Supreme Court ruling and the other courts about the gentleman who is from Maryland, who was put in the El Salvador prison?

TRUMP: Is that the one that was not Tren de Aragua but he was MS-13?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just the one that they've said needs to come back.

TRUMP: Not, but was he MS-13? Because I only know about that. I don't know which one. But if the Supreme Court said bring somebody back, I would do that. I respect the Supreme Court.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

ROSALES: Yes, and this week the Supreme Court did just that, finding the administration had to facilitate his return from El Salvador. Then we saw that tense hearing with the U.S. District Judge simply trying to find out where Abrego Garcia is in the first place, and yet the DOJ attorney repeatedly stonewalled her on details.

What do you make of what Trump is saying and then this apparent disconnect in how the DOJ is handling this case?

KAYYEM: Yes, I mean, this is another instance where sort of basic headlines about some of these efforts across the board, not simply with immigration are sort of unknown to the President. I don't know the reason why, or if he's been focused on something else.

That was -- my jaw sort of dropped that he didn't know the basics of the case. He had essentially, you know, sort of lost the case in the Supreme Court, at least. You know, the Department of Justice admitted error, and a normal administration would admit that error and cure it.

We are now at a stage where I believe it will be cured. I think the President has tipped off. He doesn't, you know, want a constitutional crisis over this. But I think the more interesting thing is that I think what we're seeing is he has a mandate in terms of immigration enforcement, and that individuals at different pieces of the government, Stephen Miller, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Secretary of State are pushing it in ways that he's not aware of.

And I think that's, honestly, that's my takeaway from this. And so it just requires either education by reporters, but certainly the pushback in the courts. In the meanwhile, I do want to say this isn't case-specific anymore.

I mean, what we're seeing is across the board, fears of coming, not just being in the United States for people on lawful status. I'm not talking about undocumented. That's a different story. Lawful status, let alone people who would come here, say, on tourism visas.

I just saw the numbers of Europeans who are sort of refusing to come here because of fears about what could happen to them. Those numbers are shockingly down, and we're going to see more of it this summer.

ROSALES: Yes. I read your piece in The Atlantic. Juliette Kayyem, always so smart on this topic. And boy, what a mess it is. Thank you.

KAYYEM: Yes.

ROSALES: Well, coming up, investigators are trying to piece together why a sightseeing helicopter suddenly fell from the sky into the Hudson River. Up next, we'll bring you new video that could produce fresh clues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN HOST: A federal investigation is now underway into what caused a small plane to crash along a busy street outside the Boca Raton Airport. Florida officials confirmed three people on board the twin-engine Cessna were killed. A man driving a car in the area was hurt after hitting a tree. The plane was headed to Tallahassee, made several loops around the airport before having mechanical issues, according to a local official.

Turning to the deadly helicopter crash in New York that killed a family of five and the pilot. New CCTV video obtained by CNN captures the moment the sightseeing helicopter broke apart in flight. We have it highlighted here in the video. The couple who took this video says they weren't home at the time of the crash, but they heard about it and decided to check their camera.

Now federal investigators are working to figure out what caused the chopper to spiral into the river. CNN's Brynn Gingras has the latest on what we know.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We do not have a preliminary cause that takes time.

BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Officials piecing together the helicopter wreckage, working toward what may have caused this sudden crash. The aircraft carrying a family and pilot, all six people on board, killed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: River traffic, be advised. You do have an aircraft down Holland Tunnel. Please keep your eyes open for anybody in the water.

RANJANAY, WITNESS: Suddenly, we hear this huge explosion and we look up from our screen and the helicopter actually kind of just exploded.

GINGRAS (voice-over): The chopper on a short, scenic trip along the New York City skyline. Forty-nine-year old Agustin Escobar, a Siemens executive from Spain, was here on a business trip, according to officials. His wife and three children traveling to join him. They went up in the helicopter as part of her 40th birthday celebration. One of their children would have turned nine today.

STEVE FULOP, JERSEY CITY MAYOR: The husband was telling people in the office how excited they were to do this helicopter tour. The family flew out to extend a business trip into a family vacation. So, I mean, the more you learn about it, the -- the more sad and tragic the story is.

[12:35:14]

GINGRAS (voice-over): The pilot, a 36-year-old veteran named Sean Johnson, started working for the helicopter company a month ago, according to his social media. Recent videos show him in the cockpit of the chopper flying above New York City. The Bell 206 pulled out of the water and dive teams continue searching for missing debris, including the main rotor and tail, according to the NTSB.

FULOP: We're using sonar because it is very murky and muddy, that part of the Hudson. And while it's not deep, visibility isn't great. And the goal is to retrieve as much of the helicopter as possible to reassemble what you can and understand how and why that happens. GINGRAS (voice-over): The aircraft is operated by a tour company called New York Helicopter, Inc. NTSB reports site two prior safety incidents involving the company in 2013 and 2015 neither resulted in fatalities. The company's CEO told "The Telegraph" on Thursday his pilot radioed that he'd be returning to base in three minutes, but never came back. I'm a father, a grandfather, and my wife hasn't stopped crying since this afternoon, he told CNN.

Officials will also be looking at maintenance records if any work was done on the aircraft and confirm if it was compliant with federal standards.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GINGRAS (on camera): The NTSB has 17 people on site working on this investigation, and we have all seen those horrific videos circulating on social media. Well, the NTSB is asking the public for any videos, any pictures to send it to them because it's possible it could provide some clues as they try to figure out what happened here.

I'm Brynn Gingras, CNN, New York.

ROSALES: Just heartbreaking there. Brynn Gingras, thank you.

Still ahead, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claims new research will determine the cause of what he calls the autism epidemic in just six months. Critics wonder if the results will be honest. We'll have that story next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:41:51]

ROSALES: Welcome back. Milwaukee's Public Health Department is facing a crisis, but it won't get the federal help it's asking for. The CDC has denied a request to manage unsafe lead levels in the city's public schools, and that's because the CDC says it lost its lead experts in the mass firings across federal health agencies last week.

Milwaukee requested assistance in March after identifying hazardous levels of lead in multiple school buildings. Lead is toxic to the brain, and no levels of exposure are considered safe. A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services did not immediately return CNN's requests for comment.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claims a new research effort will identify the cause of autism by September, but experts worry this research will not be done in good faith. For years, Kennedy has tried to link autism to vaccines, despite decades of research debunking that myth. CNN medical correspondent Meg Tirrell explains why most medical experts are skeptical.

MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the response from scientists and the autism community was really incredulity that a study that would be rigorous and large and would seek true answers here really could be done in just five months. There's also skepticism that this is being undertaken in good faith, both because of RFK Jr.'s past comments about the causes of autism and falsely linking them to vaccines, but also a comment that President Trump made in response to this announcement from Kennedy. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If you can come up with that answer where you stop taking something, you stop eating something, or maybe it's a shot, but something's causing it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TIRRELL: So President Trump, they're saying, quote, maybe it's a shot. It's important to note that dozens of studies have shown no relationship between vaccines and autism. And vaccine scientists, Dr. Paul Offit, writing the morning after this announcement, quote, it doesn't take a psychic to see where this is going. He pointed out there have been two dozen studies specifically on the measles, mumps, rubella vaccine, showing that children who get that vaccine are no more likely to be diagnosed with autism that children who don't get that vaccine.

And in fact, the National Institutes of Health, which is expected to be involved in this study, says on its website, quote, no link has been found between autism and vaccines, including those containing thimerosal, a mercury based compound. It is true, however, that autism rates have been rising over time. Back in 2000, the rate was about one in 150 kids in the United States who were diagnosed with autism. That rate by 2020 had risen to one in 36 kids.

And RFK Jr. suggested we're about to see new data that will show it's up to one in 31 kids. So that is a precipitous rise. But what advocates and researchers say is that a lot of that is driven by better diagnoses and a better understanding and a more inclusive understanding of what autism is. So improved screening tools and processes and earlier detection, all of those are really driving these rates higher.

[12:45:01]

There's also been a lot of research into what the drivers of autism are. Some of them are thought to be genetic. There are also thought to be potential environmental factors. However, experts point out that among the best studied are vaccines. And despite past comments from Robert F Kennedy Jr. falsely linking the two, there is no evidence suggesting that vaccines are the culprit here. So we will see where this study ends up by September.

But a lot of folks worried that not only will it have a pre-ordained and false finding, but that it could further stigmatize the autism community who really would rather see inclusion and support.

ROSALES: Meg Tirrell, thank you.

Still ahead, President Trump says he thinks something positive will come out of this trade war with China. But how did those caught in the middle of this back and forth feel? We'll speak to a farmer to get his perspective.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:50:34]

ROSALES: In a new episode of United States of Scandal, Jake Tapper unpacks the shady dealings of notorious D.C. lobbyist, Jack Abramoff. He was known for his influence on the inner workings of D.C. politics. But in the early 2000s, he was exposed for conspiracy, fraud and tax evasion, sending shock waves across the country. Here's a preview.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Jack Abramoff is a chameleon. Sometimes he's very religious and caring. Sometimes he's an absolute crook.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Jack was able to alter or block bills for his clients by plying lawmakers with free meals, Super Bowl tickets, exotic vacations and, of course, massive campaign contributions. By the early 2000s, Jack Abramoff was Washington D.C.'s most powerful man that you had never heard of.

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ROSALES: Oh, very exciting. Joining us now is CNN political analyst and historian Leah Wright Rigueur. Leah, thank you so much for being on. Give us a little bit of background on Jack Abramoff's dealings and what made the scandal surrounding him so shocking.

LEAH WRIGHT RIGUEUR, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST & HISTORIAN: So I think part of what made the scandal so shocking was just how widespread it was. Jack Abramoff was very involved in politics. He was well known in Washington D.C. He was often in the mix in terms of dealings. And when it came out, it wasn't just Washington dealings, it was also Hollywood dealings. He was everywhere. He was incredibly popular, but he was also very well connected.

And so when it comes out that he is so intimately connected, there's this mass fallout in the broader public because people wonder, how can someone so connected, so political be in the midst of such a wide ranging, a multimillion dollar scandal, an influence scandal as well? The other thing is you have to remember that this is coming at the end or the tail end of just an era of scandal.

So here's Abramoff, who is well connected in Republican circles, but also in lobbying circles, who is coming on the tail end of these larger scandals and housing and urban development -- development, scandals that come out of the Reagan Bush administrations as well. Scandals would think Oliver North. And here we have another scandal that is rocking Washington D.C. in K Street and just has mass implications for corruption and for scandal that I think the United was deeply fatigued by.

ROSALES: Yes, it almost reads out like a Hollywood film. How did his -- how did his crimes actually get exposed? RIGUEUR: So his crimes get exposed in a number of different ways. There are all kinds of sting operations, but there are also influence peddling operations. And so people expose them, right? He is exposed in terms of his participation in these projects. They come out, the number of payments come out, and a number of things also go belly up. So there are different. There are any number of different projects that Abramoff is involved in, which will be seeing in the documentary that airs tomorrow on CNN.

But there are any number of projects that Abramoff is involved in, all of which become public knowledge about how -- how much money he's taken, how much money he's played into and really explode in really spectacular ways.

ROSALES: And what impact has the scandal had on the overall American politics?

RIGUEUR: So I think part of the scandal has the has a larger impact and corruption scandals always have a larger impact of turning the American public against very particular individuals, but also against the idea of politicians against lobbying against influence peddling.

There's an immediacy almost immediately when Abramoff when all of these scandals come out about Abramoff, and I should be clear to you, there isn't just one scandal, there are multiple scandals over the latter part of Abramoff's career. That's what makes it so spectacular. But as the public becomes more and more aware of these scandals, the public begins to turn, they lose faith in government, they lose faith in the ability of the American people, American lobbyist groups to actually do their jobs effectively, we see the numbers drop off in really spectacular ways.

But the other area, I think that has -- that where we see a significant impact and a really powerful impact is that there is a drastic amount of attention paid to the role of lobbyists and people who are influenced peddling in these circles. So we actually don't see the first round of lobbying laws in this country until the mid-1980s. The Abramoff scandal, which happens years later, adds another layer to -- another layer to it because the public demands it.

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ROSALES: Hey, this is so interesting. We're going to be on the edge of our seats here. Leah Wright Rigueur, thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate it.

RIGUEUR: All right. Thanks for having me.

ROSALES: Of course. Well, the season finale of United States of scandal with Jake Tapper that airs tomorrow at 9:00 pm right here on CNN. We'll be right back.

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