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CNN This Morning
Fighting Scammers And Misinformation During California Wildfires; Tomorrow: Senate Confirmation Hearings For Trump's Cabinet Picks; New York City Gears Up For Crowded 2025 Mayoral Race. Aired 5:30-6a ET
Aired January 13, 2025 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[05:30:00]
SARA FISCHER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA ANALYST, SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT, AXIOS: And that's why having either government websites that are authorized where people can get accurate information is critical or making sure social media platforms are doing their job of policing misinformation so that people can get the correct info in this time of real big need.
KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: Well, I mean, that was my next question for you as someone who has covered a lot of these companies.
I mean, Twitter, for a little while, anyway, played a significant role in times like this but much of the system that they had for telling people what was true and what wasn't was at least dramatically changed if not straight up dismantled. Now, of course, Facebook has stopped doing -- using independent fact-checkers as well.
What kind of impact does that have in these kinds of situations?
FISCHER: A very big impact, although I will say about X -- when they last year stripped the verification system there was a lot of outcry around federal emergency accounts and local emergency accounts not being verified. So people wouldn't know whether or not they were the true sources of information. They did go back and add verification to those accounts. They're also verified, for the most part, on Meta's platforms like Facebook and Instagram.
And so I think anything that's verified people can trust. But the problem is, Kasie, this is a time issue. Sometimes you don't have time to be checking various social media accounts and various websites to get the right critical information. And one of the issues that they had in L.A. was that the government website alertla.org was so crowded at one point that it shut down.
So it's really, really important that everybody in the information ecosystem from the private sector to the public sector work for this together. I'm a little skeptical though given the fact that Meta says it's rolling back fact-checking and other platforms seem to be pulling back, whether or not they're going to play as equal of a role as they have in the past. HUNT: So what do you think the answer is here on that? I mean, one thing I've seen people focus on is the role of local media, which has been -- certainly, local newspapers have been in decline. I mean, local TV stations still tend to be one of the most trusted sources of news --
FISCHER: Yeah.
HUNT: -- in communities. But, I mean, what is the answer on that front?
FISCHER: And they're struggling too, by the way. A lot of people who work for the L.A. Times and these local papers are people who are impacted themselves by the fires.
You know, we've seen some nonprofits really step up, which has been interesting. There's this app called Watch Duty which is being heavily relied on by people in Los Angeles and around the country to follow in real time updates about the fire and it's very accurate. This is where people are going to understand evacuation information. It's run by volunteers.
So there is a place for these parties that aren't government and aren't necessarily for-profits can play a role. But I think in the meantime, everybody has to create sort of their information diet that they can go to, to rely on in times of emergency. And I wish I could say that people can just rely on government --
HUNT: Right.
FISCHER: -- but we're in a place right now where even the government is struggling to get ahold of this.
HUNT: Yeah.
All right, Sara Fischer for us this morning. Always grateful to have you. Thanks so much for being here.
FISCHER: Thank you.
HUNT: All right, let's turn now to politics.
Senate confirmation hearings begin tomorrow for President-elect Donald Trump's cabinet picks. Nominees, including Pete Hegseth for Defense secretary, Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Health and Human Services secretary certain to face particular scrutiny. They have been undergoing intense preparations behind closed doors.
Trump's Republican allies in the Senate expecting Democrats to try and drag things out.
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SEN. TIM SCOTT (R-SC): They're going to do everything they possibly can to delay making America great again by making sure every nominee that President Trump has chosen is actually fulfilling the responsibilities of the job.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: First up tomorrow, hearings for Doug Collins to lead the Veteran Affairs -- Veterans Affairs Department, Pete Hegseth as Pentagon chief, and Doug Burgum for Interior secretary.
Joining us now, Tia Mitchell. She is Washington bureau chief for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Tia, good morning to you.
TIA MITCHELL, WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, THE ATLANTA JOURNAL- CONSTITUTION: Good morning.
HUNT: So we've spent a lot of time talking about these nominees already. Of course, the highest profile one, Pete Hegseth, is the first out of the gate tomorrow -- or one of the first out of the gate starting tomorrow.
What do you expect to hear from him?
MITCHELL: Well, I expect him to be asked a lot of tough questions in that hearing, particularly when Democrats get a chance to ask questions. It'll be interesting to hear how he answers the questions about some of his personal behavior. But I think we're also going to hear questions from him about his resume and whether he has the right background to lead such an important federal agency.
And so that's what I'll be looking to hear from him -- you know, not just all the controversies and how he explains those but how does he explain whether he is prepared to lead our national defense.
HUNT: Tia, one of the things that our Steve Contorno here at CNN, as well as members of our Hill team, are writing is that there are going to be some questions for some of these nominees about -- from Republicans about how loyal they are to Donald Trump.
They write this. "Senate confirmation hearings set to begin this week likely to reveal a defining trait uniting Donald Trump's incoming cabinet, regardless of their diverse political backgrounds and uneven qualifications: an unflinching allegiance to the president-elect. What distinguishes this round of confirmations is the heightened expectation that Trump's picks will present not just their own expertise but a clear and unwavering loyalty to the president-elect's agenda -- a public display of fealty that was not always assured during his first term."
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It's an interesting switch.
MITCHELL: Yeah. It's interesting and quite frankly, that same fealty that Trump is looking for could be problematic for some of the nominees.
For example, we know that there are already concerns about Pam Bondi who is the current nominee for attorney general because she has dabbled in election denialism and the whole Stop the Steal of 2020. We know that was not correct, that was not true, but that's what Donald Trump continues to say.
So in this confirmation hearing she's going to be asked whether the 2020 election was legitimate and whether she's going to uphold the law as attorney general. But that might be in conflict with what Donald Trump wants to hear from her about the 2020 election. About weaponizing the Justice Department, for example. So to go after his enemies.
So I think it'll be interesting to see how they toe that line because yes, all of them are very loyal to Trump. They know that's something that's important to him. But those answers may not always play well in these confirmation hearings.
HUNT: Tia, let's talk a little bit about Robert F. Kennedy Jr. who may have one of the more interesting confirmation hearings, frankly, because there are some questions for him that could easily come from the Republican side of the aisle that might be tough for him to answer.
But let's look at -- look at what Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia had to say about her meetings and discussions with RFK Jr. and where she stands on him -- watch.
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SEN. SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO (R-WV): He came back with he's not anti- vaccination; he just is anti -- he wants to have it science-based. And that's what he kept going back to. Let's have basic science to make these decisions. In terms of -- I think he wants a healthy country. I think he wants healthier food. I think he wants a health system that works for people that need it and that want it.
And so I came away from that meeting really very positively impressed. But at the same time, he will be in front of the committee and these tough questions will be asked.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: One of the -- one of the Republicans that's been asking tough questions of RFK Jr. is Bill Cassidy, a Republican from Louisiana who is a doctor himself.
What are the other areas where he could face trouble?
MITCHELL: So I think he could face trouble in how he answers the questions. For example, we just heard Sen. Capito say his answers seemed plausible. He wanted to make sure that anything the federal government does is rooted in science. That sounds well and good.
But then if he gets in a confirmation hearing and starts talking about autism and vaccines -- well, that's not rooted in science. The science has ruled out vaccines causing autism. And so there could be a conflict there. When he starts talking about things like raw milk or fluoride in the
water it's how he answers those questions. How far does he go? If he starts getting into conspiracy theories or again, false science then I think that won't play well not just with the senators but I don't think those are -- those sound bites that are going to come of that hearing are going to play well because they're going to make him sound like he's not just -- that he's ill-informed and quite frankly that he's kind of kooky.
HUNT: What about the issue of abortion? That is one place where he historically has had -- you know, he's been -- he's supported abortion rights in the past. He is a Kennedy from a famous Democratic family. And there are a lot of places where abortion pops up for the Health and Human Services secretary.
MITCHELL: Um-hum, yeah. That could be interesting because just like there are Democrats who are concerned that his policies won't be rooted in science, there are Republicans that are concerned that his policies will be too pro-abortion. So if he starts giving answers that not only turn off Democrats in certain ways but then Republicans in other ways that could be enough to tank his confirmation.
HUNT: All right, Tia Mitchell for us this morning. Tia, very grateful to have you. Thank you so much.
MITCHELL: Thank you.
HUNT: All right, do be sure to join CNN as President-elect Trump's cabinet picks face senators. Who will get the votes needed to be confirmed? Our live coverage starts tomorrow.
And ahead here on CNN THIS MORNING the Biden-bashing Democrat who is about to announce he's running for mayor of New York City. Whitney Tilson joins us live.
Plus, the Washington Commanders advancing to the second round of the NFL Playoffs. It all came down to one moment. More from CNN sports up next.
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[05:44:18]
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ANDREW DISMUKES, CAST MEMBER, NBC "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE": Wait. That bus doesn't say Greyhound. It says Turkish Buslines.
JOHN MULANEY, ACTOR: And that, my friend, is the Eric Adams touch.
DEVON WALKER, CAST MEMBER, NBC "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE": Yeah, that's right. Thanks to me, every bus in New York now stops in Istanbul.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE" re-airing a joke about New York City Mayor Eric Adams' bribery indictment just as Adams gears up for a tough re-election campaign. Adams has voted to continue his bid despite the scandal engulfing his administration.
He'll soon be joined by more than half a dozen other Democrats in the primary election, which is set for June. The crowded field setting the country's most populous city up for fierce debates over a number of contentious local and national issues.
[05:45:10]
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MAYOR ERIC ADAMS, (D) NEW YORK CITY: What you're seeing from this crop of potential candidates is the idealism colliding with realism. The 20,000 migrants and asylum seekers coming in 8,000 a week. And then when you hear some of the things they're saying it's clear they don't have a fullness of understanding of how do you balance a budget. How do you run a city?
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HUNT: All right, our next guest also has his hat in the ring. Joining us now is investor and New York City mayoral candidate Whitney Tilson. Sir, very grateful to have you on the show. Good morning.
WHITNEY TILSON, RUNNING FOR NEW YORK CITY MAYOR (via Skype): Good morning.
HUNT: So let's talk about your bid for mayor against a candidate who clearly has a very public set of flaws. Why you at this time?
TILSON: Well look, our great city on almost every metric is headed in the wrong direction at an alarming rate. New Yorkers are hurting and angry and looking for change, and I'm the only change candidate in the Democratic primary. I'm the only candidate with a business background and the only one who isn't a career politician.
HUNT: So speaking of career politicians, the name that no one can leave out of this conversation seems to be that of Andrew Cuomo who has made no secret of the fact that he is privately thinking about this. We reported it here at CNN that Cuomo is now privately describing his long rumored and labored over run for mayor as a near certainty, according to conversations with more than a dozen people in his orbit. We reported this on Saturday.
Do you think that Cuomo would make a good mayor of New York City?
TILSON: No. He's deeply unpopular. He resigned in scandal and disgrace as governor. And he -- for New Yorkers looking for change, he is the embodiment of the career politician. He's a second generation career politician. And if he enters the race, I'm prepared to run against him and my message to New Yorkers isn't going to change. I'm still the only candidate with a business background who is not a career politician.
HUNT: Do you think that what Cuomo did in terms of the sexual harassment allegations disqualifies him from being mayor?
TILSON: Well, the women I've talked to in New York sure seem to think so.
HUNT: OK.
Let's talk for a second about migrants in New York City. The Trump administration and Donald Trump, the president-elect, has made no secret of his plans for mass deportations.
Would you support mass deportations? Would you, as mayor, allow the city to have the federal government do that?
TILSON: No, not the mass deportations. We've been a sanctuary city for many decades going back to Guiliani and Bloomberg, prior mayors. But I will absolutely cooperate with the federal government. When anyone in this country illegally commits any kind of serious crime they should be turned over to ICE and don't let the door hit them on the way out.
HUNT: What do you think it is that Democrats did wrong in 2024? Why did Kamala Harris lose the election to Donald Trump?
TILSON: Yeah. Well, it was bad. As a career, lifelong Democrat and a super strong Democratic activist it was shocking to me to see that 90 percent of U.S. counties swung toward Donald Trump compared to the prior election. And I think the significant reason for it is the average American looks at cities like New York and other blue cities and states like Chicago and San Francisco -- I could name many others. But we Democrats have been running these cities and states very poorly and we can't blame the Republicans. They're one-party cities and states.
And I think Americans looked at that and said if that's what the Democratic Party is offering, I don't want any of that, and they voted the other way. And I'm determined to change that and fix that here in my city.
HUNT: What are your -- what specific examples would you offer of ways where Democratic rule in New York City, a very blue historically city -- where have they gone wrong?
TILSON: Well basically, we tax and spend more than any other city. New York City more than double any other city on the planet Earth. And yet we aren't -- the city government isn't delivering commensurate high quality services.
Mayor Adams is out there claiming that crime is down. And I pulled the data and he's cherry picking the data. In the three years of his administration the murder rate is down 20 percent, though still up 28 percent from pre-pandemic. So New Yorkers don't feel safe on that metric.
But under every other serious felony is up double digits. Rapes are up 22 percent. Felony assaults -- like, that means a shooting or a stabbing -- are up 34 percent in the last three years to a 25-year high.
[05:50:05]
So New Yorkers -- the most fundamental job a city does is to protect its citizens. And under Mayor Adams we have become materially less safe. New Yorkers -- it's not just a perception. They are not just imagining things. The facts show that we're a lot less safe and New Yorkers are very angry about that and they're voting that way.
And unfortunately eight percent of this city's population has left the city in the last five years -- the second worst of all the 70 largest cities in America other than San Francisco. I'm going to reverse that as mayor.
HUNT: All right, Whitney Tilson. Very grateful for your time this morning.
TILSON: Yeah.
HUNT: Best of luck as you kind of formalize this campaign launch today. Thank you.
TILSON: Thank you.
HUNT: All right, time now for sports. The Commanders' wildcard playoff game against the Bucs came down to quite a moment as time expired.
Coy Wire has this morning's CNN sports update. Coy, good morning.
COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: I didn't get the memo correctly. You said black shirt underneath. Looking good, twin.
All right, this was a playoff divisional round --
HUNT: It was fate.
WIRE: -- doink -- for a Washington win. The first winning season since 2015 and now the first playoff win since 2005 season. And they did it with their rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels.
The first playoff games for rookies are supposed to be tough, let alone a road playoff game in Tampa. Fans are louder, game speeds up, hits come harder. But the 24-year-old was cool as a polar bear's toenails.
Two hundred sixty-eight yards, two touchdowns passing, including that fourth down flame thrower here to Terry McLaurin for the lead in the fourth. But also, huge runs in key moments. He left the defender grabbing nothing but towel, Kasie, on that third down to push the ball closer to field goal range there in the final seconds.
Game tied and kicker Zane Gonzalez got it. Doinks usually doink out, but not this one.
The Commanders win 23-20. Their last playoff win came when Jayden Daniels was five years old.
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JAYDEN DANIELS, QUARTERBACK, WASHINGTON COMMANDERS: It means a lot, man. And you can just see all the fans over here. Man, they waited for us. They waited a long time for this moment and this feeling, so I'm just so happy for them.
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WIRE: Now, Jalen Hurts, Kasie Hunt, and her Eagles are flying high after putting a beatdown on Green Bay. Setting the tone on the game's first play, recovering a fumble on the opening kickoff. That turned into the first of Hurts' two touchdown passes before two minutes had even run off the clock. On the other side of the ball Philly's defense intercepting the Packers' Jordan Love three times.
The Eagles win 22-10.
Now, receiver A.J. Brown, for Philly, only had one catch but he went viral after he was seen reading a book on the sidelines. He says he brings "Inner Peace" (sic) by Jim Murphy to every game and he was surprised people just now noticed.
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A.J. BROWN, WIDE RECEIVER, PHILADELPHIA EAGLES: It's something like how I refresh every drive, regardless of if I score a touchdown or I drop a pass, I always go back to that book every drive and just refocus and nothing matters, nothing happened, just read a lot (PH) back then.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WIRE: How about those Buffalo Bills steamrolling the Broncos 31-7? Superstar quarterback Josh Allen is showing why he's leading -- one of the leading MVP candidates. Unreal touchdown pass on a fourth down to Ty Johnson late in the third. Allen finishes with two TD passes. A fifth consecutive season with 40-plus touchdowns for him. No other quarter in NFL history has more than two straight.
Next up, Bills' mafia welcoming the Ravens and Lamar Jackson, the other leading MVP candidate. Buffalo still undefeated at home this season.
The wildcard round wraps up tonight with the Vikings taking on the Rams in Glendale, Arizona. The NFL moving the game from Englewood, California amid days of devastating wildfires and air quality concerns across the Los Angeles area. Kickoff set for 8:00 Eastern.
And finally, Kasie, the Patriots have hired their former player Mike Vrabel to be their new head coach, replacing Jerod Mayo, another former Patriots player who was let go after one season. Vrabel served as a consultant for the Browns this season and was head coach for the Titans for six seasons before that. The was Coach of the Year in 2021. There's five head coaching vacancies remaining, Kasie. And I will just
say having played against Vrabel the Patriots are getting a -- one tough cookie in that locker room now. He tried to choke me out on the field one time during a game, yeah.
HUNT: Yikes.
WIRE: I kind of like it.
HUNT: Oh no. I don't know how I feel about that. But congrats on the Bills, man.
WIRE: Yeah.
HUNT: That was awesome. An awesome win for them.
WIRE: Congrats on your Eagles.
HUNT: Thank you. Yes, fingers crossed.
Coy, I appreciate it. I'll see you soon, I hope.
WIRE: All right.
HUNT: All right, coming up in our next hour on CNN THIS MORNING from U.S.-China relations to AI and Trump's second term, a new report breaks down some of the biggest threats to the world in 2025.
Plus, unimaginable loss. Thousands of homes and buildings turned to ash as fire crews reach a critical stage of trying to contain the raging fires in California.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was, like, literally a nightmare. Um, I -- this whole thing that my house would still be standing and just to pull up to see our house just fully engulfed in flames was heartbreaking.
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[05:55:10]
(COMMERCIAL)
HUNT: It's Monday, January 13. Right now on CNN THIS MORNING --
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DEANNE CRISWELL, FEMA ADMINISTRATOR: The biggest concern that I have right now is the fact that we are still in such a dangerous situation.
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HUNT: The death toll rising. Crews facing new dangers this week in the fight against the flames ripping across Southern California. Plus --
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J.D. VANCE, (R) VICE-PRESIDENT ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: There was a serious lack of competent governance in California, and I think it's part of the reason why these fires have gotten so bad.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: The blame game. The incoming Trump administration pointing fingers at California Democrats over the disastrous fires.
