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Judge Arrested for Allegedly Helping Immigration Avoid ICE; Kim Kardashian Expected to Testify About 2016 Paris Robbery; Trump to "The Atlantic": I Run the Country and the World." Aired 6:30-7 am ET

Aired April 28, 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]

AUDIE CORNISH, CNN ANCHOR: 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, here's what's happening right now.

President Trump says that a third term is, quote, "not something that I'm looking into." Those comments coming in a new interview with "The Atlantic" that was released just this hour. In a few minutes, I'll be joined by one of the reporters who did that interview.

Today, opening statements will begin in the trial of three former Memphis police officers accused in the beating death of Tyre Nichols. It happened during a traffic stop in 2023 and led to national protests. They're charged with second-degree murder. They've already been found guilty of witness tampering in a federal trial.

In just hours, Border Czar Tom Homan will hold a special news briefing on the Trump administration's immigration policies. Expect to see him questioned about the three children who are U.S. citizens who were recently deported to Honduras with their mothers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM HOMAN, BORDER CZAR: If you choose to put your family in that position, that's on them. But having a U.S. citizen child after you enter this country illegally is not a get-out-of-jail-free card. It doesn't make you immune from our laws.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: A colleague of a Wisconsin judge who was arrested says what happened to Judge Hannah Dugan was an attempt by the Trump administration to intimidate the judiciary. The FBI arrested her Friday, accusing her of trying to help an undocumented immigrant avoid ICE agents. She is charged with obstruction.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDGE PEDRO COLON, WISCONSIN COURT OF APPEALS: I think they're trying to send a message to chill the judiciary, to punish someone with an uneven hand, to be handcuffed and to be brought into this situation. It's just appalling.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: President Trump doesn't see it that way.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), U.S. PRESIDENT: We have to be proud of our country. We can't let these people stay, and the courts are allowing them to stay. We're just not going to allow it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: OK, group chat is back to talk about this. And, Alex, what were you hearing from the White House about how they want to talk about this particular case? Because there has been this question about how the president deals with the judiciary and what they can do about it. And her taking this action of reportedly having their defendant exit through a nonpublic door is seen, I think, pretty aggressively.

ALEX THOMPSON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: But they are completely unapologetic. And, in fact, they would actually prefer to talk about this as a political matter now. And also, even as a legal matter, the fact is that they are intentionally defying or pushing the bounds of the checks and balances with the judiciary. They -- you know, there is sort of -- you see this in this Atlantic, new Atlantic interview. There is sort of this feeling of invincibility that they feel. And they are going to push and push and push. And, eventually, there is just going to be multiple showdowns with the Supreme Court.

CORNISH: So, this judge, Hannah Dugan, she's at the Milwaukee County Circuit. And, basically, courthouses, but also schools, hospitals, there are a number of places where ICE agents have been told it's OK. Whatever courtesies you are extending, you're not doing that.

And this is the gray area in this conversation with this particular judge. But, Stephen, you've talked a lot about this pushing of boundaries. Were some things always just courtesies? They weren't rules? You know, he's not, like, destroying all of democracy by coming up against those lines.

STEPHEN COLLINSON, CNN POLITICAL SENIOR REPORTER: I think that's true to some extent. I think what's very interesting about Trump is that, and if you look at him in comparison to recent presidents, they all understood the breadth of presidential power that they could use. But they made a decision not to push to those boundaries because they believed that was --

CORNISH: It might be politically damaging.

COLLINSON: Yeah. Or they also thought they could open themselves up to impeachment, right, especially the last few Democratic presidents. Trump has basically walked across all of those rules. And I think what's going to be really interesting to see is, with future presidents, is if they use that latitude that has been created, you know, the tools of the imperial presidency, or if Congress finally, at some unspecified date in the future, decides it wants some of its power back. CORNISH: Yeah.

SARA FISCHER, CNN MEDIA ANALYST: And look at right now, most second- term presidents, you're not thinking about a reelection, right? So this is a time when you're not trying to win the base. But this story is a winning issue for the base. It's like MAGA catnip.

And so I look at him pushing the bounds. And my biggest question is why. Because he came out with this 2028 hat. His Press Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, told Axios, that's just a hat. It's not a real thing. But if it's not a real thing, why push the limits to this extent? For what political purpose is it?

CORNISH: All right. We're going to hear more, actually, from "The Atlantic" reporter who was on this case. Now, Donald Trump's name, of course, is not on today's ballot in Canada. But I want to talk about it because his threats of annexation and tariffs are actually overshadowing the election there.

[06:35:16]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LINDSAY SMITH, CANADIAN VOTER: You put your vote where it counts a little more in this situation.

KING: And is that just because of Donald Trump?

SMITH: Yes.

KAITLYNN STRAIN, CANADIAN VOTER: Yes. Unfortunately.

SMITH: Yes.

PETER HAMILTON, CANADIAN VOTER: The biggest thing in Canada is we have friends all over the world. How many friends does Americans have right now?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Liberal Prime Minister Mark Carney vying to continue leading the country, his conservative rival lagging in the polls.

Joining us now, Toronto Mike, Host of the Toronto Mike'd Podcast. Toronto Mike, welcome back. And I remember the last time we talked, you described this shift in real time. You were hearing people move from what is a very strong conservative movement in Canada to where we are now. This is President Prime Minister Carney talking about Trump, making him an issue.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK CARNEY, CANADIAN PRIME MINISTER: The president's ideas in his head, his designs wants to break us so he can own us. The question is, who's going to stand up to that? I'm ready to do it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Is that now the referendum that people are voting on?

TORONTO MIKE, HOST, "TORONTO MIKE'D PODCAST": Without a doubt. Good morning again, Audie from Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It's tough to focus on the typical federal issues, you know, immigration, taxation. It's tough to focus on that when your sovereignty as a fiercely independent nation is at risk, at stake. So I think most Canadians who have voted and many have, but many will vote today, are voting on that singular issue. Who do you want at the helm to take on your president and his threats to make us a 51st state and these tariffs?

CORNISH: The secretary of state for the U.S., Marco Rubio, actually has defended Trump's call to annex Canada. So to your point, I want to play this for folks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARCO RUBIO, SECRETARY OF STATE: What the president has said, and he has said this repeatedly, is he was told by the previous Prime Minister that Canada could not survive without unfair trade with the United States. At which point he asked, "Well, if you can't survive as a nation without treating us unfairly in trade, then you should become a state."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Can you talk about that in particular? Has there been -- has the spurred conversation within Canada about, hey, can we stand up on our own? What -- what are we capable of?

MIKE: Yeah, without a doubt. I've heard your president make those remarks. And then I heard your secretary of state echo those sentiments.

Part of the problem here is that this this subsidy keeps getting referenced as if the United States is subsidizing our country, Canada, to the tune of like 200 billion dollars. But that is not actually a subsidy. It is a trade deficit and it's closer to $63 billion. But this trade deficit is in place simply because, as you know, we have 10% the populace as the United States of America.

So the economics are faulty. And as a result, Canadians are wondering if it isn't wise to have a world class economist at the helm at this time to take on Trump as our sovereignty is threatened.

CORNISH: Right. Even though in the past it was a liability, right, that he hadn't been in government. So this is a remarkable shift in fortunes for him.

Toronto Mike, host of the Toronto Mike'd Podcast. Thank you so much. Appreciate your time.

MIKE: Thank you. CORNISH: All right. Now we're going to catch up on a case from way

back. Kim Kardashian will finally see the people accused of robbing her at gunpoint. They're going to stand trial. It's been nearly a decade since that night in Paris. And a group of suspects nicknamed the Grandpa Gang are now going to court.

So they're accused of getting away with millions of dollars of jewelry, including Kardashian's $4 million engagement ring from her now ex-husband, Kanye West.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KIM KARDASHIAN, REALITY STAR: He tied me up with handcuffs and then zip ties and then duct tape and then duct tape my mouth and my eyes. And before he had my eyes, he had -- I saw -- before he duct tape my eyes because that was the last thing he -- I saw he found my whole jewelry box and like held it up like aha.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: So today that trial gets underway. We're going to go to CNN Senior International Correspondent Melissa Bell, who is in Paris. Melissa, it's been a decade since that night that a Kardashian, I mean, very vividly at the time, kind of described in public. Why is this trial just happening now?

MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Look, there have been, Audie, so many high-profile trials here in Paris these last few years, not least for the terror attacks of the last few years. It has taken a long time to bring these nine men and one women who will be facing the beginning of this trial later today here at this Paris courtroom to trial, although they were caught relatively quickly after the theft itself. You'll remember just how proof how high profile it was.

[06:40:17]

An extraordinary series of events. Kim Kardashian had been here with her sister for Paris Fashion Week in 2016. They'd been staying at this very exclusive address. In fact, the hotel itself is called No Address. There's no distinctive signs on it. There were a lot of security arrangements.

But this fairly brazen attack took place. They went in this gang of armed robbers dressed as policemen, overpowered the concierge of the hotel, found their way to her bedroom. And you could hear in her voice her emotion of the ordeal that she went through.

And yet, so much of the coverage and the focus in the days just afterwards were about this trail that she left on social media. Extraordinarily, one of the men who's going to be facing trial has even written a book about how he kidnapped Kim Kardashian. There was such a backlash against her for the way the engagement ring had been thwarted on social media.

But I think now that we've heard from her herself and what she went through and how terrifying it must have been. She thought she was going to be raped, and then she thought she was going to be killed. I think there's been a lot more sympathy towards her.

But you're quite right. This has taken a long time to bring these nine men, this one woman, to justice. There are another couple of people who are accused. One has since died. The others will be tried separately because of his ill health. But there's going to be a lot of attention paid to this month's trial. It's expected to last a month. She herself will be here on May 13. So you're going to spend a lot of attention for that.

She said that she expects and hopes it will happen in an orderly fashion, according to French justice. And we should get the verdict, Audie, by February -- by May, I'm sorry, 23. We'll find out exactly what happens. These men and women, many of them, face up to 30 years in jail.

CORNISH: Senior International Correspondent, Melissa Bell, on that case. Appreciate you. Next on CNN THIS MORNING, get ready to scream yee-haw. Beyonce's Cowboy Carter tour kicks off tonight. Some tickets are cheaper than a meal at McDonald's somehow. We're going to figure that out.

And who runs the world? Well, if you ask President Trump, it's him. His new interview just published moments ago about his first 100 days back in office. We'll have more from the group chat after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:46:32]

CORNISH: President Trump says during his second term, he runs the country and the world. That is from his latest interview out just minutes ago, marking his 100 days in office. He sat down with a team from "The Atlantic" in the Oval Office for their cover story. Part of that team was editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg. You might remember him as the guy mistakenly added to a group chat about military plans in Yemen. He was invited on purpose for this interview.

When the Signal group chat came up, Trump told "The Atlantic" reporters that he said to his staff, quote, "maybe don't use Signal, OK?"

Joining me now to talk about this is Michael Scherer, Staff Writer at "The Atlantic," one of the journalists behind this latest interview.

Michael, thanks for being here with us this morning. What was the vibe? I mean --

MICHAEL SCHERER, STAFF WRITER, THE ATLANTIC: Thanks for having me on.

CORNISH: -- Trump was very annoyed with the Signal chat story. So let's get that out of the way. How was it behind closed doors?

SCHERER: Well, this story was a long journey. We've been reporting it for a couple of months. We interviewed him in March by phone after he publicly denounced me and my reporting colleague, Ashley Parker, as being lunatic leftists and liars. But then when we called him, we took our call. We had a perfectly fine, gracious interview. Obviously, after that, the Signalgate thing happened. He attacked "The Atlantic" ruthlessly, attacked my boss, Jeffrey Goldberg, ruthlessly.

By the end, though, and this is just last week, he was in a far more conciliatory mood. You know, the tone of that exchange was very respectful. He was, you know, acknowledged the success of the Signalgate story, wasn't doing what he did in the days afterwards, which was to deny anything improper had happened. You know, he mentioned to us, for instance, that Pete Hegseth, the Defense Secretary, was getting his act together and he'd had a talk with him. He admitted that the National Security Advisor had gone through a difficult time as well.

CORNISH: What this article does in a lot of ways is give us a sense of his thinking when he was in, quote, unquote, "political exile after he lost." And he describes his first term. He's like, look, the first time I had two things to do, run the country and survive. And he said, I had all these crooked guys. This time around, he's really feeling like he is in charge. Can you talk about how that thinking is infusing his approach?

SCHERER: Yeah, I mean, if you remember back during the campaign, Democrats would argue that there would be no boundaries on a second Trump term. It would be very different than the first. And it turns out they may have even been understating it.

You know, Trump overcame something that really no president, no leader has overcome before. If you go back to the days after January 6th, where you have multiple Republicans voting to convict him in the Senate, you have, you know, most of the party, corporate America cutting him off, social networks cutting him off. He was able to come back to power.

And I think that experience, which is really what we tried to explore in this story, informs the boldness with which he is governing now. He really doesn't see many boundaries to going after people he perceived to be his enemies, even if he's doing things to them that he objected when government did to his allies before. He feels fine doing it now.

I mean, his economic policies obviously are very disruptive and, you know, of questionable effectiveness. And that comment about running the world. I mean, he truly does believe that he has enormous leverage at this point, not only within the country, over the country, over the other parts of government, but over, you know, a number of conflicts elsewhere in the world.

[06:50:20]

I mean, at times during that interview last week, he was talking to us about intervening in a negotiation over a dam being built in Ethiopia and continued disputes in Serbia. You know, he's a dealmaker all the way through. I think the difference is, in the first weeks and months of his first term, he felt a little bit underwater. He didn't have the people in place. He didn't really understand the town. He didn't understand how the government works. He feels like he has a much better understanding now.

CORNISH: He's also surrounded by people who possibly understand him better. You were writing about the fact that some of his White House advisers have learned to their approaches, follow ideas when he says something twice. Can you give us examples or give a sense of what this means? He sounds way more in charge, and everyone says the people around him acquiesce a little more, but, like, how is it playing out?

SCHERER: Yeah, acquiescence is one way of describing it. I think I would say, you know, the people around him don't feel like they have to manage him or prevent him from doing what he wants to do. They advise him. They sometimes tell him, you know, there's downsides to this, and they try and discourage him from doing things. But it's really different from the first term, where you had a number of chiefs of staff who either were outwardly refusing or quietly refusing to carry out orders or maneuvering behind the scenes to get him to change his mind. That's not the mood right now.

That line about if he says something twice, we know to do it really comes out of the fact that he says a lot of things. He has a lot of ideas. He throws things around a lot. That came up when they were discussing what to do with the Kennedy Center during the transition. He had the idea after reading a story that he wanted to be chairman of the Kennedy Center. He didn't get to go to the premier performing arts institution in America the first term because he was shunned by artists, and he decided he wanted to do it all himself this time, and they figured out how to make that happen.

CORNISH: Well, Michael, thanks so much for talking with us. There's a lot of great stuff in this story, including around that question about whether or not he wants to run for a third term. You can check out that article, this interview in "The Atlantic," which is out now.

It's 52 minutes past the hour. Here's a morning roundup. Some of the things you need to know as you get out the door. A boat collided with a ferry that had dozens of people on board in Florida. One person was killed. Multiple others were injured overnight.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All of a sudden, we hear the first mate yelling, hey, hey, hey, and we look back behind us, and this big yacht just came through the boat.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Clearwater police say the boat that caused the collision left the scene but was identified and may have already been located.

A man in Canada has been charged with murder after he allegedly rammed his car into a crowd in Vancouver. That happened over the weekend. At least 11 people were killed, the youngest just 5 years old. It happened at a street festival celebrating Filipino heritage Saturday night. Police say more charges are pending. And today, Harvard will have its first day in court as it challenges the Trump administration's attempt to withhold billions in federal funding. Earlier this month, the White House sent Harvard a lengthy list of demands. The university refused, characterizing the letter as an attack on free speech.

And there's this.

(MUSIC)

CORNISH: Grab your cowboy hat and boots. Tonight is the opening night of Beyonce's Cowboy Carter tour. It's going to launch out of Los Angeles. She's heading across the U.S. and Europe. If you haven't gotten your tickets yet, don't worry. Some fans online have noticed very low resale prices, some under $25.

And over the weekend, it was nerd prom here in Washington, D.C., also known as the White House Correspondents' Dinner. There was no comedian, and following the tradition of his first term, no President Trump either. But there were plenty of speeches, including one from the man right here at this table, Alex Thompson, who's accepting an award for excellence in coverage. And he delivered this message to the D.C. press.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

THOMPSON: President Biden's decline and its cover-up by the people around him is a reminder that every White House, regardless of party, is capable of deception. But being truth-tellers also means telling the truth about ourselves. We, myself included, missed a lot of this story. And some people trust us less because of it. We bear some responsibility for faith in the media being at such lows.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[06:55:08]

CORNISH: Group chat is back. And, Alex, since you're here, what have you heard from people? Because there was backlash when the story came out, right? Like, well, why didn't the media say more? Is this true? What was it like?

THOMPSON: Well, I was terrified.

CORNISH: Really? You looked very comfortable up there.

THOMPSON: Look can be deceiving. But, you know, I felt like I was winning an award, even though I was aggressive on covering Biden and his age. I felt I was winning an award for what ultimately, you know, I felt something that we fell short on.

CORNISH: And everybody who got up that night, without the comedy, which I think has propelled this event into the public consciousness, the speeches themselves became the commentary, along with a montage of things the president has said. Sara, you've been to a lot of these. You gave me an excellent pro tip,

hiding a scooter in the bushes to get from place to place. But what did you think of this? It felt to me like a chapter closing on this event in the public's mainstream consciousness.

FISCHER: It does feel that way. So this relationship between the White House Correspondents Association and the White House has been strong for decades. And it's really the second Trump administration where it now starts to feel on the brink.

If we continue to have dinners with no comedian, because the White House, you know, this year put a lot of pressure on the group not to have one. The dinner was shorter. And it continues to have this somber tone. It calls into question what the future of the dinner is. What really even is the point? I will say as somebody who's been to a lot of these, I really liked this year's dinner.

And so I hope that that's not the case. I like that it was shorter. I like the fact that it really highlighted award-winning journalism and students. And even though this relationship is really contentious, it definitely brought a sense of uniformity amongst the press corps during a really contentious time.

CORNISH: You know, here's my frustration with it. One, the criticisms that the association hasn't been strong enough in speaking against the White House when it's felt pressure. Two, you know, when Colbert roasted Bush to the ground, when people were like speaking, roasting the president, Obama, whoever, that was a moment where collectively the president had to come out of his bubble and hear what people really thought. Because the laughter is the thing that shows, oh, we all get this as a joke, right? That's why Saturday Night Live works. That's why people watch it.

I mean, the joke and the kinds of jokes tell you the real deal about how people are thinking about this. And it just, it feels like that is a loss. I don't care about the dinner, but the moment for the culture feels like a loss.

COLLINSON: That's true. Sometimes it's good to see that a president can laugh at themselves. They don't generally, they're not used to people getting their face and telling them stuff that they don't want to hear.

I think the converse of that is that the White House would argue that the people whose voices they really want to hear are not a bunch of journalists in Washington --

CORNISH: That's fair. Right, yeah.

COLLINSON: -- who are in the White House, in the Beltway bubble. They're the people outside who often, I think, have looked at these occasions with some disdain.

CORNISH: Yeah.

THOMPSON: Sorry, you can't forget that Trump has a very particular relationship with this dinner because Obama roasted him in 2011 at that dinner. And it is something that he feel -- he has feelings and in some ways rage about.

CORNISH: Yeah. And also has his own reach in comedy land, right? This just in, I want to follow up with something, you guys. The Vatican is actually announcing that the conclave to elect the next pope will begin on May 7th. That's next Wednesday. The last two conclaves lasted two days. So we may know Pope Francis' successor by next week, which is going to be my keep an eye on it, I think, because we've all been wondering about that.

Sara, can I start with you? What else are you looking ahead to?

FISCHER: Yep, so I mentioned this earlier. We have a big corporate earnings week, the first corporate earnings since Donald Trump was reelected. And I'm in particular looking at Apple because they are so heavily impacted by some of these tariffs and trade war with China.

To date, most companies have said that they haven't been feeling the effects yet. But what we keep hearing, what we're going to expect to keep hearing, weaker forecasts and slower hiring.

CORNISH: Yeah, and honestly, what they tell the money is what I believe. It's one thing what they say in public. It's another thing what they say on those calls.

Stephen?

COLLINSON: Canadian election today, Pierre Poilievre, the conservative leader, who was 20 points ahead in the polls because of the Trump intervention. Now he's locked in a very tight race.

CORNISH: Because of his alignment with Trump, right?

COLLINSON: Yeah, his positioning. He was a little too Trumpian populist. This is a guy that was marked out as a future prime minister ever since he was in college. If he loses today, it's going to be very interesting to see how he works this, tries to stay in the spotlight.

CORNISH: Yeah, and the movement in general. Alex, last word to you.

THOMPSON: Yeah, I'm fascinated by this dynamic between Trump and Vladimir Putin. Trump has long believed that he was capable of trying to reestablish, reset the relationship with Putin, that he was able to actually get along with him in a real way. That relationship has broken down the last few days over the weekend. And, you know, it's unclear if they're back on track.

CORNISH: Yeah, all of a sudden, Putin is raining missiles down. And you saw that image of Zelenskyy and Trump knee to knee, so thank you for that one.

Thanks all of you for the group chat, thank you for waking up with us. I'm Audie Cornish, and CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.