Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Fuel Cut to Engines ahead of Air India Crash; Russian Strikes Hit Maternity Hospital in Kharkiv; Crews Search for Texas Flood Victims, at Least 150 Still Missing; White House May Be Near Agreement with European Union; Bad Bunny Begins Two-Month Artist Residency in Puerto Rico. Aired 4-4:30a ET

Aired July 12, 2025 - 04:00   ET

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

[04:00:00]

(MUSIC PLAYING)

KIM BRUNHUBER, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Welcome to all of you watching us around the world. I'm Kim Brunhuber. This is CNN NEWSROOM.

We're getting new details about what caused the deadly Air India crash. Along with those details, new questions about what happened.

There's fresh skepticism about a Gaza ceasefire as Israeli prime minister Netanyahu returns from Washington without an agreement. We'll have the latest on the war between Israel and Hamas.

Plus, a look at the status of U.S. and E.U. tariff negotiations ahead of a dramatic escalation in president Trump's trade war.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Live from Atlanta, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Kim Brunhuber.

BRUNHUBER: A month after the Air India crash that killed 260 people, a preliminary report explains why the aircraft fell from the sky just after takeoff on June 12th.

But the explanation raises even more questions. CNN's Richard Quest has details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RICHARD QUEST, CNN HOST AND CNN BUSINESS EDITOR AT LARGE: The report is 15 pages long and is called preliminary. But it's pretty definitive about what took place in the cockpit.

Apparently, barely a minute after the plane took off, the fuel cutoff switches were moved from run to cut, thus starving the engines of fuel. You can see from the video of the plane as it starts to climb and then suddenly loses altitude until it crashes into buildings next to the airport.

Why did the pilots cut the fuel?

That's the question that no one knows.

One of the pilots does say to the other, why did you cut off?

And the other pilot says, I didn't cut it. I didn't do so.

And then both switches are put back on to run. But it's too late. By then, the engines have spooled down and they can't reignite in time to create lift.

We may never really know the reason why one of the pilots did switch off the fuel. What we do know is that the switches were moved in both directions and that was the cause of the crash.

Was it deliberate or by accident?

The positioning of the switch in the cockpit is specifically designed so you can't knock it by accident. The way it operates, you pull it out, lift it over and let it go. It's not automatic. It has to be done manually.

So the entire way this operation took place suggests, first, one switch, then the other, then this dialogue between the pilots and then they reverse. They switch the engines back on again. As I said, we may never know why that took place -- Richard Quest, CNN, Bordeaux.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BRUNHUBER: Earlier, CNN spoke with David Soucie. He's CNN's safety analyst, a former safety inspector for the Federal Aviation Administration and the author of the book, "Malaysia Airlines Flight 370."

He talked about the parts of the report that stood out most to him. Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID SOUCIE, CNN SAFETY ANALYST: When you flip a switch or you make any change in your parameters, you make that change and then you wait to see what happens before you make another.

So what makes this very suspicious to me is that that first cutoff happened. And less than a second later, the second switch was moved as well. It makes me very suspicious and very curious. I have never seen an accident report like this before.

I've never seen this happen before. And as Richard said, we may never know why that happened. But one of those pilots flipped those switches.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: India confirms that it's received the report. The company says it will continue cooperating with the investigation. And it stands in solidarity with those affected by the accident.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

BRUNHUBER: U.S. president Donald Trump is teasing a major announcement on Russia that's set for Monday. It comes as Moscow ramps up its assaults on Ukraine.

The Kharkiv mayor says a maternity hospital in the city was evacuated after it was hit early on Friday. The head doctor told Reuters that the attack damaged the side of the building, where delivery and surgery rooms were located. Here's how president Trump reacted to the strikes while speaking to reporters at the White House.

[04:05:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Russian drones hit a maternity hospital in Ukraine overnight.

TRUMP: I know. You'll be -- you'll be seeing things happening.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: The president didn't give any more details on his planned Monday announcement but the Kremlin says it's watching the situation closely.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that the U.S. has resumed its deliveries of military supplies after a pause on some shipments last week. It comes as the U.S. envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Keith Kellogg, prepares to visit Ukraine next week.

His spokesperson says he'll continue the important dialogue between the two countries. In his daily televised address to the nation. President Zelenskyy said he expects to see sanctions imposed against Russia.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

BRUNHUBER: It's day seven since Israel and Hamas began their latest round of ceasefire talks in Qatar but there's no agreement so far as they try to reach a truce in Gaza. Israel's prime minister conducted his own diplomacy in Washington.

Jeremy Diamond has the details. But we just want to warn you, some images in his report are extremely graphic.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now returned to Israel after a week of meetings in Washington, D.C., with senior Trump administration officials, including two meetings directly with President Trump.

And despite the fact that President Trump had said he believed a ceasefire deal could and would be reached by the end of this week, the Israeli prime minister has now returned from all of those meetings with no ceasefire agreement reached.

Prime minister Netanyahu has said that he believes a deal can be reached within the coming days. And yet, at the same time, the fact that there isn't a deal raises questions about President Trump's ability and how far he's willing to go to pressure Netanyahu to get this deal.

And I say that because Prime Minister Netanyahu, in recent days, has been emphasizing that Israel will return to the war in Gaza if the goals of this war can't be reached through diplomacy, meaning during this 60-day ceasefire, if it is agreed to, Israel and Hamas are supposed to negotiate an end of the war in Gaza.

But Netanyahu is maintaining that those negotiations must lead to Hamas' total surrender and a demilitarized Gaza strip. If not, he says, Israel will return to war in order to achieve those goals.

And that could undermine those U.S. assurances that have been provided to Hamas, that this temporary 60-day ceasefire is designed to lead to negotiations that will end that war in Gaza.

There are still a number of sticking points. But one key sticking point in these negotiations, I'm told, is the timeline and where Israeli troops would withdraw from in Gaza during this 60-day ceasefire, with a particular emphasis in the negotiations right now over the Morag corridor.

It separates the southern city of Rafah from the rest of the Strip. Questions about when and whether Israeli troops would withdraw from there during this 60-day ceasefire.

Now as these negotiations still continue in Doha, Qatar, to reach this ceasefire agreement, we are seeing Israeli strikes continuing unabated in the Gaza Strip.

And it was a particularly harrowing day on Thursday, as we saw a strike outside of a health clinic in central Gaza that was actually run by an American nonprofit. This strike killed 15 people. Of those 15, eight of the victims were children. And the aftermath from this strike is absolutely harrowing, as you can see.

The bodies of very small children splayed on the ground where the strike took place. And then also inside of the morgue at this hospital, the victims included a 4-year-old girl named Aya, who was impossible to miss in her white dress that was smeared with blood. Her mother was also wounded in that strike.

And UNICEF's executive director is also saying that the youngest victim was a baby named Muhammad, who had just uttered his first words hours before this strike, hours before he was killed.

UNICEF is now calling on Israel to investigate this strike and saying that it should, quote, "urgently review its rules of engagement to ensure the protection of civilians, including children." The Israeli military has said that it will review this incident. It claims that it was striking a single Hamas militant but it declined to name who that militant was, other than to say that he participated in the October 7th attacks on Israel -- Jeremy Diamond, CNN, Tel Aviv.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BRUNHUBER: As the death toll rises in Texas, crews are searching for at least 150 missing people.

Ahead, U.S. president Donald Trump's message as he visited the areas devastated by last week's floods.

Plus, U.S. and E.U. negotiators say they're close to finalizing a trade agreement between the two continents.

[04:10:00]

The latest on president Trump's tariffs after the break. Stay with us.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(MUSIC PLAYING)

BRUNHUBER: U.S. president Donald Trump surveyed the damage in flood- ravaged central Texas on Friday. The death toll is now 129 and at least 150 people are missing. The president and the first lady met with families affected by the devastating floods in hard hit Kerrville, Texas.

In a meeting with officials, the president praised first responders and community members. He also expressed his condolences to those who loved lost ones at Camp Mystic. The president has frequently talked about downsizing or eliminating FEMA, the federal Emergency Management Agency.

But on Friday, he said that there are, quote, "good people running FEMA."

President Trump also dismissed criticism that warnings and alerts didn't go out in time to save people from flooding and he criticized the reporter who asked about it. Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I just have admiration for the job that everybody did. There's just admiration. The only bad person would ask a question like that.

Everybody in this room did an incredible job and the public knows it. You know, the public's wise, too.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: Texas governor Greg Abbott says more counties are now part of the president's major disaster declaration that makes them eligible for federal assistance.

But there's more bad weather on the way. Meteorologists are warning that severe storms this weekend could cause new flash flooding. Meanwhile, crews are searching for victims of last week's disaster. CNN's Julia Vargas Jones has that part of the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JULIA VARGAS JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From shovels and chainsaws to heavy machinery, volunteers in central Texas are using any means necessary to find those who are still missing.

CHIEF CHARLES HOLT, CENTER POINT VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT: We're dealing with lots of huge debris fields that take lots of heavy equipment. And each time we debris something, you know, more dogs, more people are moving through and we're checking layer by layer by layer.

JONES (voice-over): Seven days out from the rains that brought catastrophic flooding, search efforts along the banks of the Guadalupe continue.

HOLT: Hopes and prayers is what we're running on and adrenaline. We want to make sure that we get everybody accounted for. That's our goal.

JONES (voice-over): We rode along with one of the teams working through some of the hardest-hit spots.

JONES: This is what the search and rescue operations are looking like now, seven days on. They're still going strong.

And not just the heavy machinery here, all of this has been combed through by different crews many times over. And they're checking, even as these machines are making these piles, to make sure that absolutely nobody is left behind.

JONES (voice-over): Officials tell us the scene up the river is the same for the 30 miles between Center Point and Camp Mystic.

Canine help has been pivotal at this stage. Before any machines can touch debris, cadaver dogs inspect every single pile. This unit came all the way from Sarasota County, Florida.

[04:15:00]

DANNY HILL, FIREFIGHTER AND UNIFIED INCIDENT COMMANDER, CENTER POINT: You are looking at America and Texas. This is what it looks like when good-hearted people come together to complete a mission with people in need.

JONES (voice-over): Food, water and donations pouring in.

HILL: The entire town is here, they're helping. But if you look around, you have support from all over Texas. You have support from the states surrounding us, just so they can bring a cooler, just so they can sit there and be side by side with the people that are struggling and lend a hand for whatever they need.

JONES (voice-over): Julia Vargas Jones, CNN, Center Point, Texas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BRUNHUBER: The Trump administration has suffered a setback in court over its aggressive immigration raids in the Los Angeles area.

A federal judge has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to stop making arrests without probable cause. The order bars immigration agents from stopping individuals based on their race, language or occupation.

The judge also ruled that the government must allow arrested immigrants to meet with their lawyers seven days a week.

In response to the ruling, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin accused the judge of undermining the will of the American people. The judge's ruling is limited to seven counties in California.

U.S. stocks fell on Friday after president Trump threatened to impose a 35 percent tariff on Canadian goods by August 1st. The Canadian prime minister is scheduled to discuss U.S. trade talks with his cabinet on Tuesday. It's not clear if this latest escalation will be a blanket increase on all Canadian exports.

Trump has also hinted his administration is close to reaching a trade deal with the European Union. Sources close to the negotiations say the current framework agreement would lock in a 10 percent U.S. tariff amid future trade discussions.

So while the president has yet to sign off on a final deal, officials expect it to be announced in the coming days.

All right. Joining me to discuss this live from Lausanne, Switzerland, is IMD professor of international economics, Richard Baldwin. He's also the author of "The Great Trade Hack: How Trump's Trade War Fails and the World Moves On."

Thank you so much for being here with us. Really appreciate it. So Donald Trump tried to play hardball with China and lost.

Should the E.U. follow China's example here?

RICHARD BALDWIN, PROFESSOR OF INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS, IMD LAUSANNE: Well, the reason China actually won the hardball was because they have such a stranglehold over the U.S. supply chain. So in particular, rare earth magnets and things like that.

And the outrageously high tariff that president Trump put on China, 145 percent, was essentially choking off the industrial inputs that American industry needed. Now after China, the E.U. is the second largest supplier of industrial inputs.

So the E.U., if they decided to play hardball, would have leverage against U.S. manufacturing and therefore against something that Trump actually cares about. But my argument is that they really shouldn't do that, because Europe also depends upon the U.S. for security measures.

And these tariffs, although they're bad and they're very high, it's nothing compared to the American security provisions toward E.U. And they don't -- I think they shouldn't try and push that back. I mean, push too hard and risk that military support.

BRUNHUBER: OK. So security considerations are muddying the waters, I guess. But in terms of leverage, I mean, as the U.S. economy weakens, so does Trump's leverage.

So I guess it's in the E.U.'s interest to kind of string these negotiations out as long as possible, right?

BALDWIN: Yes, not just the E.U. All the countries are slow-walking the U.S. because prices are rising. The economy is slowing. And that essentially means that president Trump will be very reluctant to give a gut punch to the economy with doubling or tripling the tariffs.

So the ones he announced last week, for example, would double or triple the tariffs compared to where they are now. Remember, they're at about 10 percent. Now he's talking 20-30 percent. That would lead to a big gut punch to the economy, both in terms of rising prices and Walmart and on Amazon.

But also the uncertainty would hit the economy, could tip the economy into a recession. So lots of people are thinking, he's not going to do this, because that's really what you have to focus. He cares about his base. And this might hurt his base.

BRUNHUBER: All right.

But as a tactic, what about the idea of, you know, divide and conquer?

I mean, he's threatened to split the E.U. by making separate deals with individual countries.

Is that an empty threat?

BALDWIN: That's an empty threat. So the E.U. is what we call a tariff club or a customs union technically speaking. And including in U.S. law, there's one tariff against the E.U. And so he can't put one tariff on Italy and another tariff on France. He can't do that.

What he could try and do is politically split and say that he'll give exemptions to, say, German cars but not to French cars. He could try and play with that. But he can't cut separate deals.

[04:20:00]

I don't know if you remember in his first term, he kept trying to get Angela Merkel to do a trade deal bilaterally. And she kept telling him, no, I'm sorry, we're in a tariff club. You have to do it with everybody or nobody.

BRUNHUBER: All right, so bigger picture here, let's take stock. The Trump administration would argue that his trade war has brought several countries to the negotiating table without dramatically increasing inflation here in the U.S.

And America's trade deficit was cut in half in April, which one might argue is proof that his tariffs are working to rebalance, you know, these so-called unfair trade relationships.

So how do you assess how his trade wars are working out so far?

I guess the title of your book is -- gives some indication as to your viewpoint.

But what do you think about these new trade efforts here?

BALDWIN: So I mean, I think Trump started this trade war because of grievance. He has a strong sense of victimhood, that the U.S. has been taken advantage of by foreign leaders.

And if you listen to the words on this April 2nd speech, he uses some incredibly strong words. It sounds like he's talking about war crimes. And so for him, I think he's assuaging the guilt, the grievance and he's striking back and making retribution. And I think his base likes that.

So on that score, it's a huge victory. It looks like he's standing up for America for the first time. It looks like foreigners are finally, you know, bending over to kiss the ring and that stuff. So on an emotional level, it's a big victory.

On an economic level, it's not really sure at all. Inflation is higher than it was before. Growth is significantly slower. The supply chains are significantly more vulnerable than they were before. So economically it makes no sense.

But emotionally it's super coherent. And for him it's a win. And I believe that's really why he's playing this. So that's how you can understand where he's going. So he thinks he's won.

BRUNHUBER: Yes. Adding to that list, he's -- the U.S. has actually lost manufacturing jobs despite that ostensibly being the purpose of part of the trade war.

Really appreciate getting your insights on all of this, Richard Baldwin, thank you so much.

BALDWIN: My pleasure.

BRUNHUBER: Well, hundreds of thousands of fans are heading to Puerto Rico as Bad Bunny begins his sold-out two-month residency there. Coming up, the boost that's expected to give the islands economy. Stay with us.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(MUSIC PLAYING) BRUNHUBER: Latin music megastar Bad Bunny kicked off his two-month

residency in Puerto Rico on Friday. It's projected to boost the domestic economy there by over $200 million, with the potential to attract over half a million visitors to the island. CNN's Juan Carlos Arciniegas has the latest on the sold out 30 day concert run.

Latin music megastar Bad Bunny kicked off his two-month residency in Puerto Rico on Friday. It's projected to boost the domestic economy there by over $200 million, with the potential to attract over half a million visitors to the island. CNN's Juan Carlos Arciniegas has the latest on the sold-out 30-date concert run.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JUAN CARLOS ARCINIEGAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Bad Bunny has been described by "Billboard" magazine as the king of Latin trap. He's an artist with global reach, whose popularity has allowed him to achieve something that no other Latin artist has managed.

Four of his six studio albums have hit number one on the Billboard 200 chart, a chart dominated by English-speaking performers. So when Bad Bunny announced a 30-day residency concert series in his native Puerto Rico, tickets sold out in a matter of hours.

[04:25:00]

According to the tourism agency, Discover Puerto Rico, his concert series, titled "No Me Quiero Ir de Aqui" or "I Don't Want to Leave Here," is expected to bring in about $200 million to his Caribbean island home.

And about 600,000 people are expected to visit Puerto Rico specifically for the concerts, roughly double the number of visitors it usually gets.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was amazing. I'm so excited to see Bad Bunny. It's my first time seeing him, so I'm really excited to see how it's going to be.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm feeling great. You can really feel the emotion in the air. Everybody's excited. It's a once in a lifetime event.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ARCINIEGAS: For those who couldn't get tickets. Bad Bunny will start a new world tour in November to promote his new album. Although that tour still does not include dates for the United States, Bad Bunny has not forgotten his fans there.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

ARCINIEGAS: On the 4th of July, he released a music video for his song "NUEVAYoL" with a political parody, in which a voice that sounds like president Donald Trump apologizes to immigrants in the U.S. and admits that, without them, the country would not be what it is today.

(AUDIO CLIP, "NUEVAYoL")

ARCINIEGAS: Juan Carlos Arciniegas, CNN, Hollywood.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BRUNHUBER: Pop star Justin Bieber surprised fans with a new album on Friday, his first in four years, with no promotion. The former teen sensation released a 21-song album titled "Swag," with features from popular rappers Sexyy Red, Cash Cobain and other mega producers plus interludes from internet personality Druski.

That speaks to the social media posts that have worried fans in recent months. Bieber's seventh studio album has opened to mixed reviews but is a sign that the 31-year old is expanding from his pop past that launched him to superstardom.

Oasis fans rushed into Heaton Park in England on Friday, some arriving 15 hours before showtime to secure the best spots to see the iconic British band belt out classics like "Supersonic" and "Roll with It."

It was day one of the rock band's long awaited return to their home city of Manchester, where they'll play six shows as part of their reunion tour. Oasis fever will continue with shows across North and South America, Asia and Australia.

Well, the stage is set for a rematch in this year's Wimbledon men's final. Carlos Alcaraz is looking for a third straight Wimbledon title and goes into Sunday's final a slight favorite to beat world number one, Jannik Sinner.

Sinner booked his place in the final by beating 24-time grand slam champion Novak Djokovic in straight sets. Meanwhile, Poland's Iga Swiatek is chasing her first Wimbledon title after dismissing her semifinal opponent in straight sets. She now faces American Amanda Anisimova in the final on Saturday.

All right. Thank you so much for joining us. I'm Kim Brunhuber. "ELITE ESCAPES" is coming up next and I'll be back with more news at the top of the hour.