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Secretary Of State Rubio Would Take Over As Acting National Security Adviser Once Mike Waltz Is Ousted From His Job; Tariff Impact On Supply Chains; NTSB Probing Aborted Landings At Reagan National Airport; United Cuts 35 Daily Flights Out Of Newark Over FAA Staffing; Voice Of America Restored After Judge Rebukes Trump; Trump Signs Executive Order To End Federal Funding To PBS, NPR; Index Ranks U.S. 57th Out Of 180 Countries For Press Freedom; U.S. Supreme Court Weighs Trump's Transgender Ban. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired May 03, 2025 - 17:00   ET

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

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[17:00:37]

JESSICA DEAN, CNN HOST: You're in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jessica Dean in New York.

And tonight, questions over how Marco Rubio will juggle two major national security roles and what this means for America's international standing.

In a major shakeup this week, the White House said Secretary of State Rubio would take over as acting national security adviser once Mike Waltz was ousted from his job.

CNN has learned the White House is now sorting through the logistical questions about exactly how this is going to work.

And on top of leading the State Department and serving as the president's top advisor on national security, Rubio is also acting administrator for USAID and acting archivist. These are full time jobs as well.

CNN White House reporter Alayna Treene is following all of this. So Alayna, how is the White House expecting to sort through all of this logistically and make this work?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Well, those are questions, Jessica, that they are still trying to figure out.

I mean, what was clear is Thursday morning, as a ton of media outlets, including CNN, were reporting that national security adviser Michael Waltz was soon going to be ousted.

Behind the scenes, they were still trying to figure out who would actually serve as his replacement. I was told when I spoke to many people inside the White House that they did not know that they were going to name, or that the president was going to name Rubio as the interim national security advisor once the president formally named Mike Waltz the new -- or nominated him, I should say, as the new U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations.

And so really, the question now is, how is this all going to work? How is Rubio going to juggle all of these roles? But specifically, of course, do his job as a Secretary of State, while also the job of the national security advisor?

We spoke with many people, including Brett McGurk. He is someone who served on a series of different -- of different national security councils, excuse me, including most recently as former President Joe Biden's Middle East coordinator. And he essentially said that the national security job is the most important job in Washington, and that it's very different from the secretary of state role.

So, of course, you have that kind of existential question of how is this going to work on the broader foreign relations standpoint?

But there's also simply logistical questions that the White House is still trying to sort. One is, of course, will Rubio move his office to the West wing, where Waltz used to sit just next to Vice President J.D. Vance and down the hall from chief of staff Susie Wiles and the Oval Office.

Will he have to put off and really pass a lot of his portfolio to Christopher Landau at the -- at the State Department, his deputy? I mean, all of these things, the White House is kind of scrambling to consider.

And one thing, though, Jessica is very much clear, is that they do believe that this role is going to be temporary. The president is searching to put someone in this role on a more permanent basis.

Rubio has told people that he plans to stay for up to six months. But of course, my sources have cautioned that if the president believes he's doing a good job, he could very well ask him to stay on longer.

DEAN: And I also want to ask you, Alayna, the U.N. role for Waltz requires Senate confirmation. That's a senate confirmed role.

How is the White House approaching that? How is his team going to approach that, knowing that Democrats are going to have a chance to ask Waltz about Signal gate in these hearings?

TREENE: Jessica, I think it could be a major problem for the White House, particularly because -- and we've already heard from some people this week, like Senator Mark Warner, who sits on the Intelligence Committee, that they are very eager to have Waltz in front of them so that they can grill him on the Signal scandal.

And this is something I think, that they're still grappling with at the White House themselves. I'd note that the U.N. ambassador role is a role that even during the transition, I was having these conversations with Trump's advisers that the president doesn't really care that much about.

And because he wanted to oust Waltz, a lot of this came because of his frustration with how Waltz handled all of that relating to Signal. He wanted to send him to New York.

But a serious question now behind the scenes is one, how much capital, how much are they going to invest in actually trying to get him confirmed? Or is this something that we could see, you know, potentially down the road if they believe it's going to be too hard to do, they kind of walk away from.

[17:04:50]

TREENE: I think those questions still ones that need to be sorted out, Jessica.

DEAN: For sure. Yes. Alayna Treene in West Palm Beach, thank you so much for that reporting.

And joining us now is former deputy secretary of state Wendy Sherman. Thank you so much for being here with us.

I want to go first to what we were just talking to Alayna about. And can Rubio effectively do both of these jobs at the same time -- be secretary of state and acting NSA director? What are the broader implications here?

WENDY SHERMAN, FORMER DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE: Well, these are actually two very different kinds of jobs.

The national security adviser is chief strategist. He's -- he or she is the person who brings all the cabinet members together to try to outline policies, give recommendations to the president. Very much someone who is a staff person to the president of the United States.

The secretary of state, of course, is the outward face beyond the president and vice president to the world, has to travel a great deal to really get the job done. And deputy secretaries of state, of course, I believe are quite important, having been one but cannot replace the secretary of state.

The other thing I would say, I think all the things that Alayna pointed out are accurate. The one thing I would add is when Secretary Rubio is asked to testify in front of the Congress, in front of the Senate or the House, he will be asked about lots of things. What will be under executive privilege, what will be required of the secretary of state because national security advisers historically do not testify in front of Congress.

So there's a lot of complexity here. And the world is going to be very confused about what job he's doing, how he's representing the president, and what's going on here.

I think this is headed for disaster. It's just about whether its sooner or later.

DEAN: It's interesting to hear you say the world also is going to be confused. It seems if you broaden out so much about this Trump administration and our allies, but also our adversaries. But they're all watching this play out. But the trust that we've built up over generations with our allies is

now kind of getting thrown into the air, whether it comes economically or now in terms of national security.

You say, you know, they might be confused. How much does that play into all of this?

SHERMAN: I think we're at a very, very tough place. You know, I think every leader of every country wants to put their country first. But the united states has never acted alone, even as we put our citizens first, because we have believed that we are stronger when we work with allies and partners.

President Trump has a very different approach. It's very bilateral. It's very transactional.

The world is watching a businessman who may be a very competent businessman, Steve Witkoff, try to manage three major negotiations simultaneously. The one with getting peace in Ukraine, peace in the Middle East, hostages returned to Israel and -- a really a political horizon for Palestinians.

And at the same time, the Iran deal, trying to deal with Iran's potential of having a nuclear weapon sometime in the future, something none of us want to have happen.

So there is a lot going on. The U.S. seems to be trying to do all of this by ourselves without our allies and partners. And I think that is a tremendous danger.

The trust has gone down. Countries will look to China, look to other players in the world much to our detriment, and of great concern because at the end of the day, this hits American citizens' pocketbooks and American citizens' security.

DEAN: And I do want to ask you about the national security. Putting aside not a personal assessment here, but just the idea that one person, whomever that may be, can effectively do both of these jobs and that -- I'm curious what your thoughts are on that. And if it does put our national security at risk, trying to spread somebody thin over both of those jobs.

SHERMAN: I believe, of course, it does because it's always hard to manage any of these jobs. There is so much coming at you on a daily basis, trying to move forward with the priorities of the president.

You have to be very laser focused. That's the job of the national security adviser to bring everybody together to really execute on what the president wants to get done. Whereas the secretary of state is the implementer of that policy and the external face of the government all around the world.

So I think this is a tremendous challenge. Senator Rubio has -- sorry, Secretary Rubio, having been on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, does know a fair amount about the world, whether I agree with all of his positions or not. [17:09:48]

SHERMAN: But nonetheless I think this really reflects on the president. President Trump believes he alone can get everything done. That's a really hard threshold for any individual.

It's hard for even President Trump, with all of his confidence. And it's certainly going to be very hard for now-national security adviser and secretary of state and archivist and administrator of what's left of USAID.

DEAN: I do want to ask you about some new intelligence reviewed by U.S. and western officials suggesting that Russian President Vladimir Putin's immediate goals have shifted a bit. One senior western official telling CNN that Putin is not thinking smaller but what a reasonable near-term objective is.

What -- how would you interpret that sort of information that he's now kind of eyeing more short -- short-term objectives?

SHERMAN: Well, there's no doubt that the Russian economy is in big trouble. It has paid a big price by this illegal and horrifying invasion of a sovereign country, Ukraine. It's now been going on for three years.

Russia has taken a big hit. The price of oil is not very high, and Russia relies on oil a great deal for its economy.

So it makes sense to me that President Putin would try to hold on to the gains he's made territorially and wait for another day.

The danger in all of this, Jessica, is that if indeed Russia ends up in a peace deal with all of the territory it currently holds, and the U.S. recognizes those territorial holds, Russia will just wait for another day and take over.

They will try to oust President Zelenskyy and get someone in there who would be more like the Russians and more cotton to President Putin.

I don't believe President Putin has given up on his ambition to build the Russian empire, including taking Ukraine. But he may decide he needs to do it step by step, as opposed to all at once, because he hasn't been able to do it all at once, much given the tremendous resilience and strength and courage of the Ukrainian people.

DEAN: All right. Wendy Sherman, thank you for your time. We appreciate it.

SHERMAN: Thank you.

DEAN: Still to come, Warren Buffett has strong new warnings about President Trump's tariffs as the famed investor announces plans to step away from his company.

Plus, we're talking with a supply chain expert about the real-world impacts of those tariffs. [17:12:35]

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DEAN: A new round of tariffs is expected to have a major impact on the auto industry. And starting today, nearly all imported auto parts will come with a 25 percent import tax and that levy does not protect cars made in America.

Not one of the 10 million cars to come out of U.S. plants last year was built without at least some imported parts. And while consumers may not see any price hikes right away, experts estimate the tariffs could ultimately add about $4,000 to the cost of any vehicle.

CNN's Julia Vargas Jones is joining us now live from the port of Los Angeles. Julia, how soon could consumers start to feel these impacts?

JULIA VARGAS JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, like you said, Jessica, for those full cars, if you're buying a new car, you might not see it right away.

But if you need a repair in any of the parts for your car in the next weeks, you might be able to notice a little jump on the prices already.

But we're also hitting another milestone this week. You know, those tariffs that went into place on April 9th for all of the ships that were leaving China? All of those ships have already arrived here now.

We're seeing the first wave of merchandise that's arriving from China that is subject to that 145 percent tariff. And that is already having an impact here in the port of Los Angeles, the largest port in the United States. A lot of merchandise from China comes in through right here.

We spoke with the director, the executive director of the port, Gene Seroka, who said they're already seeing a 35 percent drop in arrivals for next week.

So we are already seeing an impact. The importers are saying we're going to wait and see what happens with these tariffs first, and then we'll make decisions as to what to do.

But in the meantime, what do you do if you have merchandise that's arriving? You already paid for it. Now you have to pay the tariff. Well, one way that business owners are going around this is looking at bonded warehouses.

These are spaces that are completely legal in U.S. soil, and they're really close to ports like this one, where you can store your merchandise for up to five years and you don't have to pay taxes or tariffs on it until you take that merchandise out, presumably when you've already made a sale.

We actually caught up with one of the business owners who runs one of these places. Take a listen to what she said. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JENNIFER HARTRY, PRESIDENT, HOWARD HARTRY INC.: This is the first -- the first big shipment, one of two containers, 40-foot containers that came in, product from China that we're offloading.

[17:19:50]

HARTRY: And we're going to put it that side of our warehouse as the bonded side. And so we can't go in that side.

This part is called a tax-paid side. So all this product is, is subject to taxes and duties. So yes.

So right now they're just offloading that product. They're going to put it all on pallets. So it comes in on -- just in boxes on the floor of the container. They put it on pallets. Take it back. They're going to stack those pallets as high as we can get them. And then we wait for our instructions.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JONES: And Jessica, those merchandise that you're looking at that, it's all sorts of things. It's all things from parts from guitars that are going to be assembled and made in America, to stationary kitchen utensils, spatulas, strollers, all sorts of things, now not going to be going to shelves, right?

So that could cause all sorts of other troubles as these business owners are kind of taking a gamble, right? They're saying we hope that talks with China will go well and therefore tariffs will go down by the time that we find buyers for our merchandise and have to pay that tax on it.

DEAN: We shall see. Julia Vargas Jones, thank you so much for that.

Famed investor and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett, sharing his most direct thoughts on the trade war for the first time today. Speaking this morning at his company's shareholder meeting, the Oracle of Omaha called tariffs and trade wars a big mistake.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WARREN BUFFETT, CEO, BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY: There's no question that trade -- trade can be an act of war and I think it's led to bad things.

Just the attitudes it's brought out in the United States, I mean, we should be looking to trade with the rest of the world, and we should do what we do best, and they should do what they do best.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DEAN: Jack Buffington is the director of the supply chain program at the University of Denver. He joins us now with more.

Jack, thanks so much for being here with us. First, I do want to get your thoughts on what Warren Buffett had to say today.

We also learned that the 94-year-old will be stepping down as the head of Berkshire Hathaway at the end of the year.

So just first to get your reaction about his comments and also this news that he will be retiring.

JACK BUFFINGTON, DIRECTOR OF THE SUPPLY CHAIN PROGRAM, UNIVERSITY OF DENVER: Thanks, Jessica. Well, obviously Warren Buffett is a legend and I absolutely agree with his points on tariffs. I think they're destructive and they create market volatility.

And one thing that I think is -- was fantastic about Warren Buffett is his focus on value, his focus on value within companies and economies. We also both agree that manufacturing is the segment that has the most value. So for every dollar of manufacturing activity, there's $2.70 return back to that economy.

So I think Warren Buffett and I would agree that we need to have a more robust manufacturing economy. Not sure if tariffs are the way to get there, though.

DEAN: And listen, you're an expert in the supply chain. I think Americans got really familiar with all of that during COVID and how disruptions can cause major problems in the disruptions in the supply chain.

Set the scene for us about what we're about to experience. We were just talking to our colleague Julia, who's there at the port of Los Angeles. Set the scene for us.

What is the supply chain about to look like? How is that going to affect people out there watching?

BUFFINGTON: Yes. So one thing that was mentioned at the ports is the declining containers. So there's something in supply chains called -- it's -- there's something that's called blank sailing.

So a blank sailing is when ocean cargo ship makes an appointment for a voyage and then cancels that. Two weeks ago, blank sailings were 34 percent. Last week, blank sailings were 42 percent. These are record levels of blank sailings. They're even higher than the blank sailings were, at the beginning of the COVID pandemic.

So we're about to see major disruptions at retail. I think consumers should expect to see some supply outages. They should see some price increases.

I think the areas that will probably be most affected with consumers is consumer electronics, furniture and apparel.

DEAN: And the people should expect that to happen soon. Next weeks -- in the coming weeks?

BUFFINGTON: So these retailers built up inventory in 2025 expecting that this was going to happen. Now, the problem, of course, with building up inventories that -- that costs money and, you know, supply chains are long tail. So there's a limit on how much inventory you can build up.

So I think there's, you know, some of the big retailers are going to try to manage that. I think the small retailers are going to struggle the most.

So you know, there's just going to be a lot of disruption. And we'll just have to see what's going to happen. But, you know, with these blank sailings -- and you know, blank sailings are a sign that manufacturers in Asia are not producing, so they're not loading containers, and containers aren't coming back to the United States.

[17:24:53]

DEAN: President Trump has said that his tariffs are part of what he calls his plan to bring a new golden age to the American economy. And he's acknowledged that there's going to be short term pain. And he says it will be worth it. This is what he told NBC's "Meet the Press".

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KRISTEN WELKER, NBC NEWS HOST: Are you comfortable with the country potentially dipping into a recession for period of time if you are able to achieve your long-term goals?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, you know, you say some people on Wall Street say, well, I tell you something else. Some people on Wall Street say that we're going to have the greatest economy in history.

WELKER: Is it ok in the short term to have a recession?

TRUMP: Look, yes -- everything's ok.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DEAN: At this point, do you think there is an increasing likelihood of a recession?

BUFFINGTON: Well, if we look at what happened with the first Trump administration when they put in place tariffs, they were limited and they were targeted, and supply chains found ways around it through trans shipments and other ways of doing things.

These tariffs are much more broad sweeping. And there's -- there's fewer loopholes to get around. So I think there is going to be supply chain disruption, of course. If there's a strategy to do more assembling and production in United States, that's a good thing.

These things don't happen overnight. So I think there is, you know, a pretty significant risk of the economy, you know, going into some sort of decline.

DEAN: All right. On that note, Jack Buffington, thanks so much for your time. We appreciate it. BUFFINGTON: Thank you.

DEAN: Thank you.

And coming up, an 18-year-old man is dead and so is a Cincinnati area sheriff's deputy. We'll tell you how those two deaths are linked.

That's up next in the CNN NEWSROOM.

[17:26:50]

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[17:31:15]

DEAN: Authorities are investigating two aborted landings at Washington's Reagan National Airport on Thursday. Look at this video. It shows a military helicopter flying toward the Pentagon, forcing two passenger jets to perform go-arounds.

Helicopters near the D.C. airport have been under scrutiny for violating safety standards. In January, a mid-air collision between an American Airlines flight and a military helicopter killed 67 people.

And joining us now is Transportation Analyst Mary Schiavo. She also served as Inspector General at the Department of Transportation. Mary, thanks so much for being here with us.

Look, I think you watched that video, and it just kind of sends a chill up everyone's spine knowing what happened in January. What is continuing to go on at DCA?

MARY SCHIAVO, CNN TRANSPORTATION ANALYST: Well, what's continuing to go on, and a Senate hearing just less than a month ago also confirmed it, is that the military and air traffic control, the DOT, and the Department of Defense are still not coordinating, and the Department of Defense did not fully cooperate with the investigations.

Senator Ted Cruz complained that they didn't produce the data. He also uncovered that there was additional testing going on that apparently the FAA didn't know about by the Navy. Turns out it was a secret service where they were doing anti-drone testing that affected air traffic control.

And so for me, what everybody in Washington, D.C., or over whose heads we fly, should be outraged because we still don't have any coordination among the government how to best manage this traffic. We still have not eliminated the threats from these helicopter operations, and we still have, which hasn't been mentioned, but we still have an awful lot of commercial traffic going in and out of DCA, probably more than the airspace can handle, and these alerts continue to go off.

For example, just recently in March, there were alerts, and these were phantom alerts. They couldn't find the planes that set off the collision alerts. Turns out it was testing. The Navy says it's secret service. Secret Service isn't saying anything more.

So the government has really dropped the ball and left the traveling public in a horribly dangerous situation. It's unacceptable.

DEAN: That is -- it's very scary when you lay it out that way, just the idea that no more steps have been taken since that deadly, horrible accident in January. And this is also coming as we're -- we also see what's happening at Newark Airport right outside of New York City, where they're seeing cancelations and delays caused by what we're being told are tech and staffing issues.

There aren't enough people to run the air traffic control towers. Is this just the new reality? And what concerns do you have about what's happening at Newark?

SCHIAVO: Well, what's happening at Newark, it doesn't take a crystal ball. This has been a long time coming, and this has been a problem for some time. It's a combination of three and many more things, but three big things.

First of all, Newark has construction going on. So one of the runways, no matter which end you're, you know, taking off or landing from, is out of commission. Whenever you have construction at the airport, you have the potential for delays, you have the potential for runway incursions. And so sometimes your traffic has to be slowed intentionally because of the construction.

Two, you have a horrible staffing problem. Newark tower is supposed to be the target. According to the FAA in 2024, their target is 37 people. They have 33 people, so they're short.

But Newark is not an island, and so the traffic gets directed into Newark from Philadelphia from a terminal radar approach control facility, a TRACON. Philadelphia, a lot of people got moved to Philadelphia from New York against their will last July.

[17:35:05]

And so that's been a problem since then. The Air Traffic Controllers voice their displeasure. But Philadelphia, their goal is 114. They have 97. So there's clearly a staffing issue. And then throw on top of that, Secretary Duffy reported that the equipment is woefully outdated, a problem that has been well-known literally since the 90s.

And those three things in addition to the fact that the airlines continually put more and more traffic into Newark, and it simply cannot handle it. We have 5,000 airports. We have literally 5,082 airports and 147 TRACONs in this country. We can spread that traffic out.

But by concentrating it in Newark, O'Hare, Atlanta, especially with a traffic control shortage, we are setting up the controllers and, importantly, the traveling public for another disaster. But here it is a combination of staffing, construction, and equipment.

DEAN: Yes. That sounds like a real problem that needs some solutions. Mary Schiavo, thank you for walking us through that. We appreciate it.

SCHIAVO: Thank you.

DEAN: Yes. We'll be right back.

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[17:40:39]

DEAN: The United Nations recognizes today as World Press Freedom Day, but press freedom groups like the Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Without Borders say President Trump and his administration are actively trying to suppress reporting and intimidate news outlets.

In a win for journalists, the Justice Department now says the Voice of America, the U.S.-backed news outlet that broadcasts around the world, can go live again starting next week. The Trump White House had turned off VOA less than two months ago.

CNN's Media Analyst and Axios Media Correspondent Sara Fischer is joining us now with more on this. Sara, thanks so much for being here with us. We now know Voice of America is set to come back. Obviously, President Trump and the administration still very much in power. How do you expect them to move forward?

SARA FISCHER, CNN MEDIA ANALYST: It's very complicated, Jessica, because as part of their effort to undermine and shut down VOA, they forced virtually all of the VOA employees on leave. They also cut the VOA's lease. They did a lot of things to undermine them logistically.

So to bring the VOA back on air requires people to figure out how they're going to get back into access to systems, their e-mail, get their employee paychecks coming back. I mean, there have already been judge orders to resume payments to other U.S.-funded government broadcasters such as Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia.

And in some cases, the heads of those agencies are saying, look, judges have ruled that you have to give back our funding, but we haven't gotten the funding yet, so we have to lay people off. So I expect this to continue to be very complicated. I don't think this is the end of some of these court battles.

The hopeful thing, though, for people who care about press freedom, is that overwhelmingly the courts have sided with these organizations. In some cases, like with the AP's lawsuit, it's them citing the First Amendment. In other cases, as is the case with the VOA, they're basically saying that the president does not have authority in the executive branch to overrule congressional funding and mandates. It's an overstep of his power and of the power of the administration.

DEAN: And also President Trump this week trying to pull funding from NPR and PBS by executive order. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which provides their funding, counters that it was set up by Congress and the president can't do that by executive action. I know you interviewed the PBS CEO this week. What did she tell you? FISCHER: Well, basically she said that PBS was ready to vigorously defend its organization if Trump were to try to go after it in the same way that it did its parent, the CPB. Now, CPB last week sued the Trump administration for trying to fire three of its board members.

Remember, CPB is not a government agency. It's independent. They received almost immediately an injunction from a court saying that the president did not have the authority to do that. And so it wouldn't surprise me if entities like NPR and PBS, which, again, their funding is congressionally mandated, would feel comfortable and confident issuing a lawsuit in response to some of these efforts, seeing how quickly courts backed CPB.

I also think that they're pretty hopeful Republicans may step up, especially PBS. If you take a look at NPR, the vast majority of that programming is news programming, so it's easier to politicize. PBS is a much different beast.

Paula Kerger, the CEO, told me that news programming is only about 10 percent of what the overall PBS landscape produces. Remember, you have the PBS national entity and then you have all of those nationally syndicated broadcast stations. PBS, people forget, is responsible for things like Downton Abbey.

They do a lot of non-news programming, Ken Burns documentaries. In fact, Julia Child, the first major cooking show, launched on PBS. So I also expect that to be part of PBS's case to try to lure support from Republicans on the Hill as they try to figure out what to do with this executive order.

DEAN: Yes. And a new ranking out on world press freedom puts the U.S. in 57th place. That is a new low, saying the press is in an increasingly hostile environment. It's, quote, "Donald Trump's second term as president has brought a troubling deterioration in press freedom".

Where do you think journalism goes from here? Obviously, it's a big question in journalism about how to cover and meet this moment and what happens next.

[17:45:06]

One of the big takeaways from that report, which I covered, was that across the various metrics that you can measure press freedom, you've got legal freedom, you've got economic freedom, you've got sort of regulatory and political freedom. The economic freedom was a huge problem, especially here in the U.S.

They cited Donald Trump's efforts to undermine the press through some of these executive orders, but they also cited just issues of, in America, outlets struggling to find funding. And this is particularly at the local level. Jessica, you know we have so many local news deserts that have popped up over the past 10 years as big tech companies eat advertising revenue that used to go to local.

I think what we're seeing is that, in America, philanthropists are the people who tend to be stepping up to address this issue. So within small communities, philanthropists that used to donate to hospitals or into education systems are now starting to fund news outlets. So I think that's going to be a hopeful place where this goes.

But overwhelmingly, we don't have a market solution for the failure of media companies to continue economic success. In some countries, I think about other Western democracies, like in Great Britain, et cetera, they have systems where there's a lot of public funding for media. As you can tell from this conversation, we don't really have that kind of support right now in the U.S.

DEAN: All right, Sara Fischer, as always, good to have you. Thanks for your thoughts on that. We really appreciate it.

FISCHER: Thank you.

DEAN: More news when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:50:56]

DEAN: The U.S. Supreme Court could soon decide whether it will take up a consequential case from President Trump. He wants the justices to keep his ban on transgender people serving in the military, at least while the issue works its way through the lower courts. Trump implemented that ban in 2017 through a series of tweets that blindsided top military brass.

Three years later, in his first week in office, President Biden lifted the ban. Just days after Trump returned to the White House, he put the ban back in place. The back and forth has left some battle-ready service members on the sidelines. And CNN's M.J. Lee has more.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

M.J. LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Do you remember the first time you put this on?

LT. NIC TALBOTT, TRANSGENDER U.S. ARMY RESERVIST: Yes, I do. This particular one was at basic training. I was starting to think I was never going to get to wear this, and here I am. And especially now, you know, getting to be a lieutenant and getting to wear my rank. I worked really hard for this.

LEE (voice-over): Lieutenant Nic Talbott waited almost nine years to enlist in the U.S. military. Now he's the face of Talbott versus Trump, a lawsuit that could determine whether transgender individuals can be banned from serving in the military.

MAJ. ERICA VANDAL, TRANSGENDER U.S. ARMY OFFICER: I've deployed before my transition, during my transition and after my transition. My ability to meet the standards, to maintain my readiness and my deployability has never changed throughout this time period.

LEE (voice over): For Army Major Erica Vandal, her 14 years as an active duty soldier now hang in the balance as she prepares for her next deployment to Iraq and Syria. Talbott and Vandal are among a group of transgender soldiers suing the Trump administration. They could get an answer as soon as Friday on whether the Supreme Court will allow President Trump's ban to go into effect while the cases make their way through the lower courts.

TALBOTT: I used to be Nicole Kathryn (ph).

LEE (voice over): Talbott began his transition from female to male as a teenager.

TALBOTT: This is from my mom's wedding. This is like -- probably like just shy of a year on hormones at that point.

LEE (voice over): In 2017, the first Trump administration's ban on transgender service members upended Talbott's plans to enlist.

TALBOTT: My phone just starts buzzing like crazy. And I'm not sure what's going on. And I remember my best friend Jessie (ph) being on his phone and him saying, you know, hey, Nic, I think we should probably pull over at this rest stop up here and maybe take a lunch break. You don't want to be driving when you hear this. I just kind of remember in that moment going, oh, my gosh, what am I going to do now?

LEE (voice over): At the time, Talbott had no choice but to put on hold his pursuit of enlisting. When the Biden administration lifted Trump's first ban, he started trying again. Talbott enlisted a year ago.

LEE: And how did that feel?

TALBOTT: Oh, obviously, I still get emotional talking about it. It was like the most incredible feeling ever. At that point, I'd been working for this for right around nine years.

LEE (voice over): He's now a lieutenant in the Army Reserve but doesn't know for how much longer because of Trump's ban.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: To ensure that we have the most lethal fighting force in the world, we will get transgender ideology the hell out of our military. It's going to be gone.

PETE HEGSETH, DEFENSE SECRETARY: Get rid of all the DEI, all of the -- not transgender nonsense, all of the quotas, make this -- if you want to have different standards, fine, but have different standards for different jobs.

LEE (voice over): The Pentagon also said in a memo that "the department only recognizes two sexes, male and female. An individual sex is immutable, unchanging during a person's life."

LEE: The executive order says, quote, "adoption of a gender identity inconsistent with an individual's sex conflicts with a soldier's commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one's personal life." TALBOTT: Statements like that couldn't be farther from the truth. You know, I look in the mirror every day now and I go, yes, this is like -- this is the most Nic Talbott version we've ever had of Nic Talbott. It's just absolutely ridiculous to insinuate that trans folks and trans service members are, you know, going home and trying to pretend to be something that we're not.

LEE (voice over): Major Vandal's career is also in limbo.

LEE: If tomorrow you got the news that you could no longer be in the military, what would that do to you?

VANDAL: It would be devastating.

[17:55:07]

LEE (voice over): Born into a military family, Vandal commissioned in 2011 as a lieutenant after graduating from West Point. She began her transition from male to female in 2021.

LEE: Was there anything you found physically more challenging after the transition?

VANDAL: Oh, sure. I think hormones can change a lot. I think there was definitely a reduction in muscle mass and everything associated with that. So, you do have to work harder in that regard.

LEE (voice over): After she transitioned, Vandal says her military duties and responsibilities remain the same, but she found herself pushing harder.

VANDAL: You kind of feel that need to prove that you do truly belong. So maybe you work that little bit extra, work that little bit harder just to prove you're still capable of meeting all the same expectations, you know?

LEE: You mean as a woman, you feel like you have to prove yourself more?

VANDAL: Yes. And again, there's never been anything explicit associated with that. Maybe it's just my own self expectations.

LEE: So the DOJ is arguing, without the Supreme Court taking action, the military will be, quote, "forced to maintain a policy that it has determined, in its professional judgment, to be contrary to the military readiness and the nation's interests." What do you think about that?

VANDAL: If anything, I think removing proven soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, proven leaders with very specific skill sets would be what's detrimental to the readiness of the military. They would be removing decades and decades of training that's gone into these people, millions of dollars invested in these individuals, and they'd be removing it for no reason associated with their ability to do their job or meet their standards.

LEE (voice-over): M.J. Lee, CNN, Washington, D.C.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DEAN: M.J., thank you for that.

Still ahead, President Trump wants to cut $1.5 trillion in spending over the next decade, and that leaves Republicans in Congress at odds over how to make that happen without cutting programs a lot of Trump voters rely on.

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