Return to Transcripts main page
Early Start with Rahel Solomon
President Trump Teases Possible Sanctions on Russia Ahead of a Major Announcement Monday; Thunderstorms Bring More Flooding and Some Evacuations to Central Texas; Border Czar Tom Homan Dismisses Lawmaker's Complaint About Alligator Alcatraz Detention Facility. Aired 5-5:30a ET
Aired July 14, 2025 - 05:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[05:00:00]
MIN JUNG LEE, ANCHOR, EARLY START: Good morning and welcome to our viewers joining us from the United States and all around the world, I'm MJ Lee, Rahel Solomon is off, it's Monday, July 14th, 5:00 a.m. here in Washington, and straight ahead on EARLY START.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President Trump is teasing possible sanctions on Russia ahead of a major announcement on Monday.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I am very disappointed with President Putin.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Central Texas is awash in even more heavy rain just a week after deadly flash flooding. The rain putting a pause on all those search and rescue operations.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: New reporting from a controversial new detention center in the Florida Everglades.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hundreds of immigrants with no criminal charges in the United States are being held at Alligator Alcatraz, according to an investigation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEE: U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to make a major announcement on Russia in the hours ahead. And he's teasing the possibility of imposing sanctions. It comes after Moscow hit Ukraine with escalating drone and missile attacks over the weekend. Here's what President Trump told reporters on Sunday, as his frustration with Russia's Vladimir Putin is growing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I am very disappointed with President Putin. And I thought he was somebody that meant what he said. And he'll talk so beautifully and then he'll bomb people at night. We don't like that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEE: U.S. Senators Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal are pushing a bipartisan bill that they've introduced to slap sanctions on Russia. They say it could be the sledgehammer President Trump needs to end the war. Meanwhile, the U.S. special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Keith Kellogg, has arrived in Ukraine.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's chief of staff says they will discuss sanctions, weapons and quote, "enhancing cooperation between Ukraine and the U.S." President Trump is set to meet with NATO Secretary- General in Washington this week. That meeting comes just days after the President announced a deal with the alliance to send much needed weapons to Ukraine.
Let's go to Steven Erlanger; chief diplomatic correspondent in Europe for the "New York Times", he joins us live from Berlin. Stephen, it's great to have you. You know, this major statement on Russia that the President says he'll be making today, it comes as his frustration towards Putin appears to have reached a new high. What do you suspect is likely to be the contents of this announcement?
STEVEN ERLANGER, NEW YORK TIMES CHIEF DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENT FOR EUROPE: Well, Trump likes to advertise and then deliver like a game- show host. I think he will talk about the U.S. being willing to sell weapons to Ukraine, but selling it through NATO countries.
In other words, the U.S. won't pay for them, but the U.S. will provide air defense missiles, Patriots, and maybe other even offensive weapons to NATO countries who buy them, who will on pass them to Ukraine. And this is even though the U.S. won't pay, this is a big shift for Donald Trump.
And as you say, does show his increasing exasperation and anger with Vladimir Putin who refuses to have a ceasefire in Ukraine and refuses to give President Trump the victory that Mr. Trump wants.
LEE: So, Steven, listen to how Senator Lindsey Graham described his Russia sanctions bill over the weekend, and then we'll talk coming out of it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): A turning point regarding Russia invasion of Ukraine is coming. Dick and I have got 85 co-sponsors in the United States Senate for congressional sanctions with a sledgehammer available to President Trump to go after Putin's economy and all those countries who prop up the Putin war machine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEE: I know you said you think the announcement will be about weapons and NATO. I mean, do you think that Trump could also get behind these sanctions? And if he did, how much of a direct impact could it have on the war that Putin is waging right now?
[05:05:00] ERLANGER: Well, it will be very interesting to see, because Mr. Trump
has threatened sanctions on Putin often and never delivered. I mean, he intermittently gets frustrated. So, maybe he's reached that point. Now, the bill that Lindsey Graham and Dick Blumenthal have sponsored will need revision. It is more than a sledgehammer. It would hit some American allies very hard.
But if Trump would support a version of it, I think that would make a big impact. The bill hits the Russian energy economy. Russia still makes lots of money from exporting oil and even natural gas. So, the bill is aimed at creating huge costs to that economy, and to the people who actually buy Russian energy.
So, we'll see if the President goes along with it. It does have bipartisan support. And yet, he has been so reluctant to hit Russia with sanctions, even to update the current sanctions America has on the Russian economy. So, maybe he's reached that point.
LEE: Yes, I mean, you said that we've seen President Trump get intermittently frustrated when it comes to this conflict. There has been an evolution, right, when it comes to his rhetoric about Putin. You know, this is a President who has praised the Russian leader in the past and his actions in Ukraine as genius and savvy. And now, he's calling out what he says is Putin's B.S. What do you think has really gotten him to this point?
ERLANGER: Well, Trump kept saying, and his people around him kept saying, we don't want to hit Russia because we want Putin to come to talks with Ukraine and agree to this 30-day ceasefire that might turn into larger talks. And if we punish Russia, Russia won't talk. But I think President Trump has realized over time that Mr. Putin thinks he's winning the war, that he has no intention of stopping, that he is, as Mr. Trump once said, tapping him along.
And now, we'll see whether Trump has reached the point where he's willing to put more economic pressure and even sanctions on Russia to get Putin to talk.
LEE: Yes, we'll certainly see about that. Steven Erlanger in Berlin, thank you so much for joining us.
ERLANGER: Thank you.
LEE: President Trump is rushing to the defense of his Attorney General Pam Bondi. Here he is, giving her a thumbs up at the FIFA World Cup final on Sunday in New Jersey. Bondi has sparked a furious MAGA backlash for a memo, stating that there is no evidence that accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein was murdered, or that he kept a client list.
Multiple sources tell CNN, the President personally made phone calls to Bondi's most vocal critics in an effort to tone down their criticism. CNN's Kevin Liptak has more on the fallout from Washington.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER (on camera): President
Trump really spent the weekend trying to quell this political crisis, begun last week when the Justice Department released a memo essentially saying that its case into the late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein was closed. That has caused a splintering among President Trump's MAGA base.
And now, the President is trying to tamp down on the furor. He appeared over the weekend with his Attorney General Pam Bondi. She was in his box at the FIFA World Cup in New Jersey. She has really been the subject of a lot of ire from the President's supporters, who disagree with her decision to try and put the Epstein matter to rest.
The President wrote on social media on Saturday, that he thinks Bondi is doing a fantastic job, and that when it comes to the Epstein case, he encourages his supporters not to waste their time and energy on the matter. And he says that Epstein, who we should note the President socialized with in an earlier life, was, quote, "a guy who never dies".
Now, this is all, I think, meant to try and quiet some of the outrage, but it's not at all clear that the President has been successful. He also spent part of Sunday calling some critics of Bondi to reiterate that he stood behind her, and that he wanted to put the Epstein matter to rest. One open question is whether this will all satisfy the disappointment of the deputy FBI Director, Dan Bongino, who actually threatened to resign over this entire matter.
He has not shown up to work since there was a dust up in the West Wing last week, where he was essentially accused by some of President Trump's aides of leaking negative information about Bondi. We should note Bongino has openly said that he doesn't particularly like his job at the FBI.
[05:10:00]
He left quite a lucrative podcasting career to take the post. A podcast, we should mention that often fans some of the conspiracies about Epstein himself. Now, on Sunday, as President Trump was returning here to Washington from New Jersey, he did say he had spoken to Bongino and essentially said that things had been smoothed over. Listen to what the President said.
TRUMP: I spoke to him today, Dan Bongino, a very good guy, I've known him a long time. I've done his show many times. And he sounded terrific, actually -- no, I think he's in good shape.
LIPTAK: Now, some of Bongino's supporters seem to have been holding out hope that the director of the FBI, Kash Patel, might follow Bongino in threatening to resign. But he essentially put those questions to rest himself over the weekend, saying that he intended to stay in his job for as long as Trump calls on me.
Now, in his social media post, Trump called on Kash Patel to move on from the Epstein matter to focus in part on the debunked claims that Trump won the 2020 election. The President didn't mention Bongino at all in his social media post. I think all raising the question of whether Bongino will show up to work on Monday morning. Kevin Liptak, CNN, the White House.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEE: Still to come, a string of thunderstorms resulted in mandatory evacuations for central Texas residents. We'll bring you the latest on the situation there after the break. Plus, the U.S. government claims the people held at Florida's controversial new migrant detention center are all criminals. But a new report finds that's not the case.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:15:00]
LEE: At least, 132 people are dead after the catastrophic flooding in central Texas. Slow-moving thunderstorms continue to threaten the area with heavy rain, plus the potential for flash floods and rapid river rises. On Sunday, parts of Texas were under mandatory evacuation orders in Kerrville.
Storms forced ground searches to temporarily suspend operations. The chance for more thunderstorms continues today with rivers forecast to swell into flood stage this week. And FEMA is facing scrutiny for its response in central Texas flood sites, and some agency officials are pointing to bureaucratic hurdles that led to obstacles in mounting rescue efforts. CNN's Julia Vargas Jones has the latest.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JULIA VARGAS JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): The rain putting a pause on all those search and rescue operations. We're hearing from those leading those operations that the safety of firefighters and Cajun Navy officers is paramount right now, and it's just too dangerous for them to be out on those waters today.
But tomorrow, the hope is that all of those operations will pick back up after that river crests and goes back down. But I do want to show you one photo that was shared with CNN earlier on Sunday, showing just one vehicle under a pile of debris and gravel. It's not just water that they're battling. There's so much debris, so much mud.
And that just goes to show the difficulty of those searches as they continue to look for those people who are still missing. This, as now, we are hearing questions about FEMA's response in the first 72 hours after this disaster. CNN reporting that due to bureaucratic obstacles, officials inside the agency said that there was just so much red tape they could not deploy those search and rescue teams.
They -- usually, they would have been in place ahead of the formal authorization from FEMA just to have a quick response in the area. Now, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem pushed back on those claims, saying that the response from FEMA was swift. Take a listen.
KRISTI NOEM, SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY, UNITED STATES: You know, those claims have -- are absolutely false within just an hour or two after the flooding. We had resources from the Department of Homeland Security there, helping those individuals in Texas. It was a heartbreaking scene, and I think it's been well covered about what the Coast Guard did, how they were deployed immediately and helped rescue so many individuals from those floodwaters.
And we had Border Patrol down there with their tactical teams, and FEMA was there just within a few hours as well. So, those claims are false. They're from people who won't put their name behind those claims, and those call centers were fully staffed and responsive.
JONES: The call centers that she is mentioning there have to do with reporting from the "New York Times" that contracts that had expired on July 5th, the day after the floods began here in central Texas, were not renewed until five days later, which delayed the answering of so many calls, thousands of calls to the crisis assistance line that went unanswered.
We're also learning that Kerr County officials here had submitted back in October a report to FEMA that said that this very nature of this event could happen in the next 12 months. All of that just chilling details as we look forward to Monday, where those officials will be meeting to talk about those responses here in Kerrville, Texas. Julia Vargas Jones, CNN, Kerrville, Texas.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEE: Heavy rain caused severe flooding across central New York state on Sunday. The National Weather Service said as much as 4.5 inches of rain fell in some areas. Video from the village of Newark Valley shows trash and other debris carried along by the floodwaters, which left this street completely submerged.
[05:20:00]
And police in Kentucky say two women were killed by a gunman at a rural church on Sunday. Officers shot the suspect who was declared dead at the scene. The incident began at a nearby airport when the gunman opened fire on police during a traffic stop. He then fled to the church, where the shooting began at worshipers.
Two men at the church were injured, one is in critical condition. The officer shot during the traffic stop is in stable condition, and so far, police are not identifying the shooter. The "Miami Herald" and the "Tampa Bay Times" say they have obtained a list of more than 700 migrants who have either been detained at, or may be sent to what the Trump administration calls Alligator Alcatraz.
According to the report, lawyers are having difficulty locating their clients who were sent to the controversial facility in the Florida Everglades without their knowledge. The newspaper say that state and federal officials are not sharing information about who is detained there. CNN's Rafael Romo tells us more about the report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RAFAEL ROMO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): When President Donald Trump toured the migrant detention facility in the Florida Everglades earlier this month, he said that it would very soon house some of the most menacing migrants, some of the most vicious people on the planet, he said.
But a new report published Sunday suggests that may not be the case. Hundreds of immigrants with no criminal charges in the United States are being held at Alligator Alcatraz, according to an investigation by the "Miami Herald" and the "Tampa Bay Times", which obtained records about the migrants being held there.
According to the report, there are more than 250 people who are listed as having only immigration violations, but no criminal convictions who are being held together with those accused and convicted of crimes. The report says only a third of the detainees have criminal convictions with charges that range from attempted murder to illegal re-entry into the United States, as well as traffic violations.
The information comes from a list of more than 700 migrants who are either already being held at the tenth(ph) facility or are scheduled to be transferred there. Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who was part of a group of Florida elected officials and members of Congress who had access to the migrant detention center on Saturday for the first time since it opened earlier this month, reacted to the report on Sunday.
REP. DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ (D-FL): We were very suspect of that because they have a bracelet system of red, yellow and green, I believe. And, you know, there weren't -- we could hardly get up close to any of them, but it was clear that there were not many with red bracelets. But then the "Herald" story comes out this morning and shows that hundreds of these 900 detainees have no criminal conviction. And that was our suspicion to begin with.
ROMO: Wasserman Schultz also said that migrants are packed into what she described as cages with 32 people inside, each-holding unit and only three toilets available. In an interview on CNN's "STATE OF THE UNION" with Dana Bash, White House border czar Tom Homan dismissed the claims, suggesting the Democratic lawmaker's complaints about conditions at Alligator Alcatraz are politically-motivated. This is what he had to say.
TOM HOMAN, U.S. BORDER CZAR: I've been doing this job since 1984, detainees complain about the conditions of detention, and I've said this many times, you can simply go to ice.gov and look at the detention standards ICE has. It has the highest detention standards in the industry.
ROMO: After touring the detention center Saturday, Representative Darren Soto, a Democrat, said lawmakers also witnessed evidence of flooding, highlighting serious concerns of what could happen to detainees if there's severe weather during what forecasters said may be a busy hurricane season. Rafael Romo, CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEE: Children collecting water in Gaza are among the latest killed in Israeli strikes in the enclave. Those details ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:25:00]
LEE: With Gaza ceasefire talks faltering in Doha, there's been no let-up to the Israeli airstrikes. We need to warn you, viewers may find this next video disturbing. It shows a chaotic scene in the central part of the enclave after an Israeli airstrike hit a water distribution point. Gaza officials say six children were among the ten Palestinians killed at that site on Sunday.
The Israeli military has acknowledged the strike missed its intended target, which they say was an Islamic Jihad terrorist, and that it fell dozens of meters away. The IDF says it is reviewing the incident. CNN's Nada Bashir has more now from London. But first, another warning that viewers may find some of the images in her report disturbing.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NADA BASHIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Well, despite days of proximity talks in Doha around a proposed 60-day ceasefire and hostage release deal, negotiations appeared to have stalled yet again, with both sides accusing each other of putting up new obstacles. On Saturday, an Egyptian source with direct knowledge of those indirect talks told CNN that negotiations were deadlocked as a result of additional demands put forward by Israel.
With a senior Hamas official telling CNN that talks had faltered as a result of new conditions introduced by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, including new redeployment maps for the Israeli military in Gaza. Those reports come after an Israeli source also told CNN last week that the key outstanding issue on the table was at that point, the terms around where the Israeli military would redeploy in Gaza once the ceasefire takes effect.
