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Pope Francis Now Lying in State at St. Peter's Basilica; Navigating Your Finances During Uncertain Times; Supreme Court Could Require Schools to Offer Lesson Opt-Outs. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired April 23, 2025 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Uncertainty is kind of where the consumer sentiment in the markets are at right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AUDIE CORNISH, CNN ANCHOR: So, the Trump administration is looking to cool trade tensions as the president claims the ultimate tariff on China will not be 145 percent.

Good morning, everybody. I'm Audie Cornish. I want to thank you for joining me on CNN This Morning. It's half past the hour. And here's what's happening right now.

Stock futures all in the green. The rally seems to be helped by President Trump's comments that he has no intention of firing the Fed chair and the possibility of a de-escalation in the trade war with China.

Right now in London, it was supposed to be a major meeting about Russia's war on Ukraine between top officials such as Secretary of State Marco Rubio, but instead just lower level officials are going to be there. Secretary Rubio's office said he had to cancel because of, quote, logistical issues.

And at the Vatican, Pope Francis now lying in state at St. Peter's Basilica, the public is getting their chance to pay their respects. His coffin will actually remain there until his funeral Saturday morning.

And with memorials and honors for the pope officially underway, cardinals will soon begin the process of choosing his successor. Now, they're going to convene what is known as the papal conclave. More than a hundred cardinals gather inside the Sistine Chapel, where rounds of voting take place until a new pope is elected.

It's a secretive process. It's expected to begin between 15 and 20 days following the death of Pope Francis. Technically, the next pope could be bap any baptized Catholic man, but in reality, he's going to come from the College of Cardinals. So, who is going to lead in that conversation? Nobody can say. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARDINAL TIMOTHY DOLAN, ARCHBISHOP OF NEW YORK: There's only one person who knows the Holy Spirit, okay? We got to figure out who the Holy Spirit wants. And that's a heavy responsibility.

And these next days are extraordinarily important when we're together. So, the cardinals now meet every day.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: All right. Joining me now, Joseph Capizzi, the dean of theology and religious studies at the Catholic University of America. And, Joseph, thank you so much for being here.

JOSEPH CAPIZZI, DEAN AND ORDINARY PROFESSOR, THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA: My pleasure.

CORNISH: Before I get to the sort of details ahead, what struck you about this morning? I know for me, seeing that coffin, seeing an open casket was very striking.

CAPIZZI: Yes. The simplicity of the coffin, of course, right, bearing, you know, sort of the character of the pope. He entered as a simple pope and he's leaving us as a simple pope. So, that simple wooden coffin is striking the body.

Catholics value the body. The bodies are often present at Catholic wakes. And anytime you're confronted with a dead body, there's something deeply moving about it. And so I was struck by, yes, just seeing him there lifeless in that simple coffin. I mean, that's a kind of a reminder we all go out that way.

CORNISH: I want to talk about what these cardinals are thinking about going into the next couple of days. I'm under the impression you have to be under the age of 80 in order to vote. Now, unfortunately, a lot of people have been watching Conclave, the Oscar nominated film, to get a sense of what's going to happen. That's not a documentary. So, why don't you give me a sense of what goes into their choice, who has the qualities of a pope and what does that even mean?

CAPIZZI: Sure. They're looking for the op, the spirit to speak to them. And what's going to happen is, first, they're going to get together with a general meeting or a few general meetings before they even think about voting. And in those meetings, men will emerge who seem to express sort of the moment, the guys that they're looking for who have the character or the disposition to lead the church forward. That conversation is going to be much more important than what anybody's talking about right now.

You may recall when Pope Francis was elected, he was somebody who was viewed as sort of having -- his moment had passed to some extent.

CORNISH: Yes. So, he had come in second during the conversation about Pope Benedict. CAPIZZI: Correct. And I think we thought that was as close as he was going to get, and now there was going to be somebody else. But in those general congregations, apparently, that's when he reemerged as a live candidate. So, I think that's when you're going to get a sense of, okay, we're not going to hear about that, of course.

CORNISH: Yes. But then why do we have so many names of potential frontrunners. I know that Pope Francis had so much influence in the makeup of this recent college because people aged out, so to speak, so he was able to bring more cardinals in. Give us a sense of then why these certain names have come forward.

CAPIZZI: There's different reasons. One is the age range looks right for a lot of these guys. So, to some extent what you're looking at is somebody who's not too young and obviously certainly not too old. So, somebody around 79 or 80 is probably not going to be a candidate. It's going to be somebody in the, you know, mid to late 60s to early 70s.

The church is much more global. The College of Cardinals is much more global than it used because of Pope Francis. So, there are candidates from Africa and from Asia who look papabile, you know, as they say, right, popable.

[06:35:00]

And those guys, you know, seem to be people who are thought of as forerunners. Sometimes it's agenda-driven, like people who seem like they might actually carry forward.

Pope Francis' agenda or people who in fact might sort of slow it. So, some of those sorts of things are the things that are presenting some of these guys as --

CORNISH: Yes, because there was a more conservative movement, especially in the U.S. but had who had been pushing back or very critical of Francis and the things that he was doing.

CAPIZZI: That's right.

And he also undermined the kind of career track, so to speak, of being in of bureaucracy.

CAPIZZI: He was really concerned about that. And he was concerned about what he called clericalism, just this idea that you're sort of settled into certain positions or even bureaucratic positions within the church. And to some extent, you know, he sort of gave off the notion that this is repellent. This is not what Catholics should be. This is not what men who lead the church should be. They should be servants first. Simple people are here to serve. And anybody who looked too interested in being positions of authority doesn't look like they're as interested in serving. So, that was something he was quite concerned about.

CORNISH: This is great insight for the days ahead. Stay with us.

CAPIZZI: My pleasure. I want to turn to one other thing for a minute, because in this economy, I know it is easy to feel stressed out, okay? We're talking about markets being up and we're talking about markets being down. What the president is saying, tariffs are on, tariffs are off.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Serious question, how are people affording anything in 2025?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: American dream to buy a home is dead.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Okay, voices of the people, right, out in TikTok land. And we want to know -- we want to help you figure out your finances during this uncertain time.

And my next guest is here to help. Ramit Sethi is the author of Money for Couples. Thank you so much for being here.

People may know you from your Netflix show, from online. And what are you hearing from people who reach out to you about what it's like to be in this economy right now?

RAMIT SETHI, AUTHOR, MONEY FOR COUPLES: A lot of confusion. And the biggest question is, what should I do now? And the good news is that we don't react to short-term changes in the market. The bad news is that this trade war, these tariffs are completely unnecessary and they're really disrupting most people's personal finances.

CORNISH: You know, in your book, Money for Couples, you actually list some I found startling statistics. For example, you say 50 percent of couples don't know their income, which I don't even totally understand how that works. But, yes, all of these details about kind of how people are kind of in the dark about what their financial situation is. So, in this moment, can you help? I mean, or is it just wait and see seems tough for people who might be tipping on the edge?

SETHI: No. There are things you can do and you're right. It is shocking that 50 percent of people I speak to do not know their own household income. It happens every single week on my podcast. You've never heard a couple just admit openly when I say, hey, did you know you actually make that much? And they just look at me like, nope. That's because most of us think on a month-to-month basis. Most of us are not thinking beyond what happens this month or next month, and you have to.

So, one of the biggest changes I'm recommending right now for the second time only in 21 years is to keep a 12-month emergency fund.

Now, that might seem shocking. How am I supposed to get 12 months? I don't even have two. We can talk about how. But this just shows the severity of what is going on. We don't know what will happen and nobody can predict. But from what we're seeing in early data, it does not look promising in terms of employment. So, I always want to provide a buffer. I want to be safe. I want to be conservative. That's why I want to be targeting a 12-month emergency fund.

CORNISH: We've got some news here that late credit card payments have been higher. And, you know, one of the things that strikes me about your show is that there's a lot of shame in financial struggle, where people are trying to kind of cover it up, either using credit or just not wanting to feel themselves in that position. What do you tell people in this moment where, I don't know, it's like not really their fault in a way? How do you think about it?

SETHI: I tell them to read a book. By the time people are 40, the biggest worry they have is their finance. It's very simple. And they worry and they fight and they feel anxious and guilty. But the vast majority of Americans have never read a single book about money.

Now, it could be my book, it could be somebody else's, but if you want to get ahead, if you want to know how to build an emergency fund, or if you want to know the difference between a Roth IRA and a 401(k), which can be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, you need to be conversant in the basic language of money.

So, while we have things happening politically. We need to focus on what we can control, and that means knowing our four key numbers, how much we earn and what we are doing with our money.

CORNISH: And what I hear you saying is that it's not too late, which, Ramit Sethi, I appreciate you saying.

[06:40:03]

SETHI: It's never too late. You can always start right now and you can make rapid changes.

CORNISH: Okay. You can find his book, Money for Couples, wherever you find bookstores, if there are left.

I want to talk about something else now, which is actually kind of related to books. The Supreme Court has a case that touches on identity, religion and parents' rights. And the court's conservative majority is signaling that it will require schools to allow parents with religious objections to opt their children out of lessons that involve LGBTQ books.

So, here's one of the lawyers who's arguing on behalf of some of those parents.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ERIC BAXTER, SENIOR COUNSEL AT BECKET FUND FOR RELIGIOUS LIBERTY: We are optimistic about our chances. They seem very concerned about the content of the school books, the instruction to teachers to disrupt students either or thinking about sex, to rewrite the norms and to just really do things that are contrary to the things that their parents are trying to teach them. (END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Okay. Many other parents, teachers, even students, see this case as a chance for the court to decide whose stories can be excluded.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JILL ORTMAN FOUSE, FORMER MONTGOMERY COUNTY, M.D. SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER: When you have your kids in public schools, and especially with the diversity we have in our public schools, you need to make sure everybody's included.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: All right. Group chat is back, and we asked Joseph Capizzi to enter the chat from Catholic University of America because of this case has these religious implications.

Do you mind setting the table for us? Why is this -- of all the kinds of cases, prayer in school, things like that, why is this one of interest to so many different constituencies?

CAPIZZI: Sure. The first right a parent has, as a parent is educating their children. And from a religious perspective, that's your most important obligation towards your children, is to educate them into your faith. And when something conflicts with your faith, you become deeply concerned about that.

CORNISH: And we should be clear, people want the right to say, okay, this is a lesson I don't want my kids in correct. They're the ones who get to leave the classroom.

CAPIZZI: Correct, that's right.

CORNISH: And the schools were arguing basically that everyone's going to be getting up for all kinds of reasons, and maybe this doesn't make sense in a public school setting. What do you hearing in the arguments?

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: So, what's interesting to me about this is what the actual Supreme Court is debating it looks like or considering is what the idea of a burden is, right? Because this has been implemented before people were allowed to opt out in Montgomery County, and the school found it too onerous. And so what the Supreme Court is actually looking at is, is it too onerous, or is this actually something that they can do in order to respect religious freedom?

Now, on the other side of this, there is the parents' rights groups to say that parents really should be the last arbiters to decide what kids should be learning, especially if it conflicts with their religious belief. On the other side of this, there is this sense that, you know, do you want, especially in a public school setting -- what are schools for? Are schools to reflect the world as it is, which includes LGBTQ people, or is it to reflect the world as parents wish it to be?

CORNISH: Yes.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: And so it is this idea of like what are the schools actually there to do?

CORNISH: I want to let you guys jump in here, because this is one of those things where people actually will send this to me in my group chats because there's horseshoe politics when it comes to parents and parents' rights, where you might have immigrant communities that might consider themselves more progressive, say, but wait a second, on certain issues. I don't want the school telling my kid they have to X, Y, and Z. You have these progressive parents who were like, but, look, blah, blah. So, what do you hear in a discussion like this? It's one of those moments where the politics aren't totally clear.

ELI STOKOLS, WHITE HOUSE AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT, POLITICO: I have a four and a two-year-old. In my four-year-old's class, there is a very active parental chat. We haven't gotten to this yet.

CORNISH: Yes. Give it a minute. Yes, exactly. Prepare.

STOKOLS: I think it's fair to say that even at a really, like a preschool level, you can sense that the curriculum, the experience for kids is far different than it was when I was growing up when I was in school. That's just the nature of a changing society, nature of public education, adapting to it you know, beyond the legalities of the case.

I will just say, having a 4-year-old who's incredibly and surprisingly observant about the world, I know we're going to get these questions about the world. Whether they come in a top down educational environment or whether they're just questions about the world, as a parent, you know, you're going to have to be prepared for this.

Yes. But people have been arguing about whether or not the parent, as you said, is the parent the final word.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Is it -- are they the gatekeeper? And also the question is, should these things be excluded? I mean, they're not just talking about saying --

CORNISH: Wait, hold on, Lulu. I want to give someone else a chance here. We're not just talking about exclusion. We're talking about the option, right, which is what it sounded like the Supreme Court was leaning into those arguments, as you said, onerous. Is it really that difficult for the schools to let kids walk out?

GARCIA-NAVARRO: But what schools might end up doing, because you saw some of this legislation pass in my home state of Florida that, quote/unquote, the don't say gay law. And it started with the option of talking about, you know, four and five-year-olds and should they be exposed to some of this.

[06:45:00]

And it ended up that actually it was such a chilling effect that now there is practically no discussion in public schools about LGBTQ all the way up through high school. And there's a real sense of fear. And so that is part of the wider discussion.

SABRINA RODRIGUEZ, NATIONAL POLITICS REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: Yes. That's part of the broader debate here is the reality is it's not just about this, it's us having a conversation. Is there a slippery slope here? Is it going to turn into schools having a hard time navigating how exactly to implement this?

And as Lulu said, in Florida, we've seen that. Okay, now schools are handing out permission slips and, oh, how do you get -- people aren't turning in the permission slips or there's just a broader debate of how to implement it.

CORNISH: And more aggressive parents after parents after the pandemic, parents' rights movement.

CAPIZZI: The case is not going to be decided on a slippery slope argument. It's going to be decided on a fundamental rights argument --

CORNISH: Because of the way this court is leaning or just because?

CAPIZZI: Because the way the court seems to be leaning and because the way it should, to be frank.

The question here is, as Lulu said, the burden, right? And it's a burden weight against the most fundamental right that we have, the right of free expression of our beliefs and we're only asking to opt out here. I'm a Montgomery County resident. This is all that's being requested here, is what was initially extended in the first place, the right to opt out of something that you find to be contrary to your faith.

CORNISH: Well, it will be interesting to see how this develops, especially as the growing movement of homeschooling, people could be having their kids in Catholic school, they don't have to be in this discussion. It'll be interesting to see sort of where the public sentiment is.

Joseph, thank you so much for sticking around.

CAPIZZI: My pleasure.

CORNISH: Thanks for entering the chat.

The rest of you stay with me because coming up after the break, we're going to talk about Elon Musk because he claims he's going to shift his focus back to Tesla, which has been suffering as the company's earnings plunge.

Plus, thousands evacuated as wildfire rages throughout parts of New Jersey. We're going to have more from our friends here at the table.

Please stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [06:50:00]

CORNISH: There's been a shakeup at CBS's 60 Minutes. Longtime Executive Producer Bill Owens is out, resigning because he says that the network won't let him do his job. In a memo obtained by CNN Owens told show staff quote, over the past months, it has become clear that I would not be allowed to run the show as I have always run it.

Now, this comes as part of the fallout from President Trump's lawsuit against the network over a 60 Minutes interview with Vice President Kamala Harris last fall. Now, Trump's team had claimed that it was deceptively edited.

Joining me now, CNN Media Analyst and Senior Media Reporter for Axios Sara Fischer. Sara, can you help us understand why this matters, maybe even why this Trump case leaned so hard on CBS?

SARA FISCHER, CNN MEDIA ANALYST: Yes, it's because it represents a broader attack on the news media that people feel is stripping its independence to be able to cover the government and hold it accountable. Donald Trump sued CBS as a civilian, Audie, last year.

Then when he took office, his FCC chair, Brendan Carr, waged an investigation against CBS, and so the challenge is CBS's parent company, Paramount, is currently seeking regulatory approval from Trump's government, from his administration, for a broader merger that will essentially save the future of the company. But if they are battling this legal battle with Donald Trump in a separate court, it begs the question, do you settle? Not because you think what you did was wrong, but because you're trying to get regulatory approval for your merger, it sets a very, very bad precedent.

People at 60 Minutes are furious. This has completely disrupted the operations of 60 Minutes and CBS news, and I think, unfortunately, people look at this as a sign of the times that press freedom in America is not what it was.

CORNISH: Before I let you go, do we know if this was a sign, as he implies, of actual exertion of pressure of some kind on him running the show? Because when I think about Jeff Bezos at The Washington Post talking about what their op-ed page is going to have, the owner of the L.A. Times kind of being more aggressive there, is this another case where these external political pressures are having an effect?

FISCHER: I mean, if you look at the episodes all year, they've been very critical of Donald Trump. So, it doesn't look like there's been interference so far. But I think that Bill Owens saw the writing on the wall, which is that if his parent company doesn't get approval for this merger, it's super hard to figure out how it's going to continue to live on, especially in this economic environment.

And so it likely means that they're going to have to settle this case, and that would mean that Bill Owens, who's been at CBS for well over three decades would sort of have to conceive wrongdoing when he doesn't believe he did it. I think it's just a moral clash and that's why he's out. CORNISH: CNN Media Analyst Sara Fischer, thank you so much.

FISCHER: Thank you.

CORNISH: Okay. It's 53 minutes past the hour, one last morning, round up some of the stories I want you to know to get going with your day.

New this morning, Vice President J.D. Vance says that both Russia and Ukraine need to reach a deal now, or the U.S. will walk away from peace talks. Sources tell CNN the U.S. ceasefire proposal requires Ukraine to recognize Russia's annexation of Crimea, but that's something Ukraine's presidents as his country cannot do.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

J.D. VANCE, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: The current lines somewhere close to them is where you're ultimately, I think, going to draw the new lines in the conflict. Now, of course, that means the Ukrainians and the Russians are both going to have to give up some of the territory they currently own. There's going to have to be some territorial swaps. So, I wouldn't say the exact lines but we want the killing to stop.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Talks are underway right now in London, but only with the lower level staffers after Secretary of State, Marco Rubio and other diplomats bowed out.

And in a few hours, opening statements are set to begin in Harvey Weinstein's retrial. The jury is made up of seven women and five men. An appeals court threw out his previous conviction and 23-year prison sentence last April.

[06:55:04]

The retrial beginning today includes a new allegation from an accuser who wasn't part of that first trial.

And we're following the massive wildfire spread overnight across Southern New Jersey. More than 3,000 people been evacuated.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GIANA NICHOLAS, NEW JERSEY RESIDENT: Smoke flooded the streets. People were evacuating. At first, it was, you know, voluntary. It's your choice to evacuate. Then it was mandatory. So, everyone started leaving, packing up their cars and heading out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: The winds may be dying down this week. As of now, officials say the fire is just 10 percent contained. Part of the Garden State Parkway, one of the busiest highways in the state, is now closed.

We're going to turn to one last thing. Elon Musk saying he's planning to pay more attention to Tesla as its earnings report showed profits had plunged. It says its overall revenue is down 9 percent with auto revenue dropping 20 percent, but it's net income falling a whopping 71 percent compared to just a year earlier. Musk told investors yesterday he's planning to limit his time working for the Trump administration moving forward and will return to Tesla next month.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ELON MUSK, CEO, TESLA: There's been some blowback for the time that I've been spending in government with the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. There are some challenges. And I expect that this year will be -- it will probably be some unexpected bumps this year.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: All right, bringing back the group chat to talk about this.

So, I always think that what people tell the money is what's really going on. Like it's one thing to go out and message things in interviews, but when you have to look the investors in the face or have those calls, that's when it gets real. So, what did you hear and what he had to say? Can you kind of give us a sense of how that call went down?

RODRIGUEZ: Yes. I mean, the reality is that, again, this is where we see the actual impact that's happened financially in his life. But for me, the question is, he said on that call that his efforts with DOGE were mostly done.

I think there's a real open question in the weeks and months to come about what exactly has DOGE accomplished. We know about the headlines about the chaos that has ensued in agencies across Washington.

CORNISH: But they have a list receipts, right? Don't they post actual --

RODRIGUEZ: They do. But the reality is that we've seen from more intensive reporting that some of those receipts have not been accurate, and some of the cuts that they've said that they've accomplished, you know, judges have stepped in and said, oh, well you need to reinstate these workers.

So, the reality is how much money has actually been saved from this project that's supposed to be, you know, promoting government efficiency. And he's saying, you know, he's going to stay on and keep, you know, a watchful eye. I think there's also just a question, how much is he actually stepping back and what actually has he accomplished?

CORNISH: Plus, all of his people are working, like a lot of them are people who had worked for him in one capacity or another.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: I just want to say again that DOGE is not an official agency. It is a, you know, creation of the mind of Elon Musk. And the way that it has been implemented is, you know, with him at the center. The real question for Elon Musk is, you know, one to two days a week, what does that actually mean?

And the issue is not what he's done at DOGE. It's also about how he's handled himself in Twitter, the kinds of political statements that he's made. That is what's hurting his company.

CORNISH: If you're watching the business channels, they have been talking about what kind of leader is he.

STOKOLS: And the fall on the price and all the impact on Tesla, that's market-driven. That's a reaction from people who used to want to buy these cars, who are now saying, I'm not supporting this guy. And so I don't know how you put that toothpaste back in the tube saying, I'll stick around for a day or two, a week, and continue to do this work. It seems a little more like face-saving rhetoric than anything real.

Obviously, the tone he had on that call with investors, as you noted, a lot different than sort of much more rambunctious Elon with the chainsaw on stage at CPAC. I mean, this is a different phase now that they're entering into.

And Sabrina's right, they have scaled down the talk about what DOGE was going to do. Initially, they were talking the trillions. A week or two ago it was Musk in the Oval Office saying, well, $150 billion. And we don't even know if that's the case.

CORNISH: Yes, exactly.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Elon's very unpopular. I mean, this is the other thing, if you see poll after poll, and this is among Democrats definitely, but Republicans also increasingly. And so if Elon steps back, that might be an opportunity for a reset with the administration.

CORNISH: Here's the thing I was kind of watching out of this call. I don't know if we have it, but he started to also talk about what future innovations he has coming up, especially in manufacturing. And, of course, he has these robots, which he hopes to be the future, I guess, worker. And I thought like that was such a weird footnote to have in this conversation about reindustrialization, about bringing manual manufacturing back to the U.S. and the person who has kind of the ear of the president, this is actually the worker he's looking forward to.

I want to thank you guys so much for being here, the group chat. We covered so much ground on this very, you know, difficult day, I think, as people are mourning the pope, and we're going to be following that today.

[07:00:00]

I want to thank you all for waking up with us. I'm Audie Cornish.

Please stay with us because CNN News Central has more out of Rome, out of the Vatican, and that's going to start now.