Return to Transcripts main page

The Situation Room

Trump Weighs Tapping Fierce Loyalist Kash Patel For FBI Chief; Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) Says, House Ethics Committee Shouldn't Release Gaetz Report; Trump And Allies Approaching Transition With An Eye On Revenge; Elon Musk Embracing New Role As Trump's "First Buddy"; Rudy Giuliani Hands Over Mercedes-Benz, Luxury Watches And Diamond Ring To Georgia Election Workers He Defamed. Aired 6-7p ET

Aired November 15, 2024 - 18:00   ET

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

[18:00:00]

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Happening now, Donald Trump has an eye on yet another very controversial firebrand to take on a critically important role. Sources telling CNN the president-elect is considering one of his fiercest allies, Kash Patel for FBI director.

This as we're tracking all the fallout from Trump's other provocative picks. We will tell you why House Speaker Mike Johnson is pushing back on calls to release an ethics investigation into Trump's choice for attorney general, Matt Gaetz.

And it's deadline day for Rudy Giuliani, the former Trump attorney and former New York City mayor on the clock to turn over valuable assets to election workers that he defamed or faced possible jail time.

Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer. You're in The Situation Room.

Our coverage begins tonight with the Trump transition. It's been a very busy week, full of provocative picks, and it appears the president-elect might be on the verge of yet another very provocative pick.

Let's get straight to CNN's Kristen Holmes. She's outside Trump transition headquarters in West Palm Beach, Florida, for us, Kristen, Trump is weighing a very controversial name to lead the FBI.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Wolf. We are told that MAGA allies are trying to push for Kash Patel, someone who has been a loyalist to Donald Trump, a loyalist to the cause for several years to try and lead the FBI.

Now, it's uncertain how exactly Donald Trump is going to handle this. But one thing we know about Kash Patel is he's somebody who, forward- facing, has essentially said the same thing that Donald Trump has said that he wants to do, dismantle the FBI, take apart the Department of Justice. And now after he named attorney general Matt Gaetz, it certainly seems as though that could be a possibility that he would choose Kash Patel. One thing to keep in mind here, when you talk to members of Donald Trump's inner circle, they really are split on Patel. You do have a faction of people who believe he's a loyalist, that he believes he's good in this position, but there's also people who believe that he's gone too far and also that he's unconfirmable for a position at the FBI. Obviously, we'll have to wait and see.

However, as we've seen this week, Wolf, Donald Trump doesn't seem to really put that much stock into who is confirmable or not. Just a little bit of a rundown of people who he has nominated for various positions, as we said, Matt Gaetz, we know that at one point or at some point that it's likely that this ethics complaint is going to come out. We'll see how that affects the confirmation process and going through that approval process. We know that there are Republicans who were shocked by that decision.

The other one to keep an eye on is Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. We do know that these claims, our investigative team putting forward reporting, that California officials confirmed that there was a police investigation into sexual assault involving Hegseth back in 2017. So, that could impact any kind of confirmation there.

And the other one, RFK. RFK Jr. is someone who is considered, largely up until Donald Trump named him, unconfirmable by a number of people. I mean, remember, he is an anti-vaxxer who has pushed conspiracy theories around health. But Donald Trump said on the campaign trail he was going to put RFK in charge of health, and he did. So, clearly, he's sticking by his candidates for now.

BLITZER: We shall see what happens in the coming days. Kristen Holmes, thank you very, very much.

Our political experts are here with me in The Situation Room. And Leigh Ann -- let me start with Leigh Ann Caldwell. Kash Patel, he's a fierce Trump loyalist, as we all know, but he has said some rather provocative things over the years. I want to play some clips. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KASH PATEL, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF TO THE ACTING DEFENSE SECRETARY: I'd shut down the FBI Hoover building on day one and reopening the next day as a museum of the deep state. And I'd take the 7,000 employees that work in that building and send them across America to chase down criminals. Go be cops.

We're going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections. We're going to come after you. Whether it's criminally or civilly, we'll figure that out. But, yes, we're putting you all on notice.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: What do you think of his chances of getting confirmed by the U.S. Senate? LEIGH ANN CALDWELL, EARLY 202 CO-AUTHOR, THE WASHINGTON POST: So, that question has come up a lot this week when I've been on Capitol Hill talking to senators about this, not only about people like Kash Patel, but Tulsi Gabbard to be the director of National Intelligence, Matt Gaetz to be attorney general, Pete Hegseth to be defense secretary.

[18:05:05]

So, I will say that there is going to be a lot of pressure on these Senate Republicans to back Donald Trump's nominees, regardless of the controversy surrounding them, that it's not only going to be pressure from Donald Trump, who is unlikely to back down from his picks, but also there is the online and Trump coalition pressure campaign that has really consistently put pressure on the Senate Republicans. There are threats to primaries of some of these people -- to first Senate Republicans as well. And so this is going to be a huge test for Senate Republicans on what they're going to do with some of these nominees.

BLITZER: It's going to be a nerve-wracking situation.

Meghan Hays, Republicans say Trump has a mandate to make picks like Kash Patel. How do you respond to that?

MEGHAN HAYS, FORMER DIRECTOR OF MESSAGE PLANNING, BIDEN WHITE HOUSE: I mean, yes, he did win the White House and they do have a majority in the Senate and in the House, very slim margins. I'm not sure that it is a mandate that they are thinking it is, but it doesn't mean we pick incompetent people to run major departments that determine our government and impact so many people.

So, yes, he may have a mandate, that he won, but that you still should be putting people in charge who are capable of doing the job and are qualified of doing the job.

BLITZER: You used to work Lauren in the U.S. Senate, on the Intelligence Committee, right? So what's your assessment right now?

LAUREN TOMLINSON, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: So, my assessment is more of a political one at this point, which is he does feel like he has a mandate. And then the question is, and I think the big takeaway from this election is the people wanted change.

So, what is qualifications? We're all sitting in D.C. saying that these qualifications need to come from a place of experience, and we measure it in a certain way. Donald Trump's coming in and saying, we're going to blow this up. And you see this from the DOGE, you know, efficiency committee that he's put together and a lot of these other things.

And my question remains, you know, how do we actually determine in this new mandate what is qualified and what isn't? Because I think that that's going to be what Trump is going to say is, I don't want people that go in and can maneuver the bureaucracy and pull these levers. I want people to go in and blow it up. And so that's what people elected him to do. And I think that's what you're seeing with a lot of these confirmation picks. BLITZER: Very controversial ones. Jasmine Wright is with us. As you know, there's a major fight that's brewing in the House Ethics Committee right now whether or not to release this report on Trump's attorney general pick, Matt Gaetz, an ethics report. This is something even some Republicans are calling for right now, right?

JASMINE WRIGHT, REPORTER, NOTUS: Yes. I mean, not just some Republicans. A lot of Republicans want to see, particularly in the Senate, who are going to have the job, as Leigh Ann said, of confirming this pick that a lot of people within even his own party don't necessarily like him, don't necessarily like what he stands for and the things that he has said over the course of his national and federal career. And so they want to see what the Ethics Committee has been investigating for the last two or some odd years, even some of what the Department of Justice who were first investigating him and then dropped it, what they came to the conclusion for to try to make their decisions because they obviously have a huge responsibility.

Yes, they will be under a lot of pressure from Republicans and from Trump himself to confirm Matt Gaetz, but they're under a lot of pressure to go through the facts and come to their own conclusions whether or not they want to obstruct or block him. And so they want all the information possible, and that includes that ethics investigation.

Now, of course, we heard Speaker Mike Johnson saying today, you know, basically kind of leaning on the House Ethics Committee, something that we haven't necessarily seen before, and say, you know, I don't think it would be within the best interest for them to release it. But, of course, it's going to be up to the people on the committee and other Republicans, and even with some Democrats, whether or not that happens.

BLITZER: What are Matt Gaetz's chances, Leigh Ann, to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate?

CALDWELL: So, when Matt Gaetz is nomination came down, senators on Capitol Hill were aghast, Republicans as well. 24 hours later, talking to these same senators, I had seen a little bit of a shift where senators who thought that there was no way said, okay, well, we're going to have to go through this confirmation process. This is Donald Trump's nominee. We do trust Donald Trump to choose people. And so we're going to see where this goes, including people who have no love lost with Matt Gaetz.

And so the confirmation process is going to be extremely important. And I asked Senator Susan Collins, who's very concerned. She said, well, all of this stuff will come out in the FBI background check and the investigation that we do. And I think that there's a question still on if Donald Trump is going to submit his nominees to FBI background checks as well. We're going to see how this process plays out.

BLITZER: Meghan, now what about Pete Hegseth, the Fox News Weekend host, who is now being potentially nominated to become the next defense secretary? Apparently back in 2017, he was being investigated for a sexual assault. He denies this. What do you think?

HAYS: I mean, I don't know what the specifics around that case are but obviously that doesn't bother Donald Trump as he's also been accused of sexual assault and doesn't seem to bother him.

[18:10:04]

But this goes back to your point on qualifications. All of these people's main qualification is being loyal to Donald Trump. So, I think, yes, this is why we have Senate confirmation hearings and this is why we do these things. But if the president-elect and these folks aren't going to submit to background checks, how valuable are these hearings going to be? And then how far are some of these senators going to go out on a limb? Because they're not going to go out on a limb for everyone. They have reelections and they have presidential aspirations in the future. So, it'll be interesting to see the Republicans.

BLITZER: Apparently, so far, Lauren, Trump is rejecting what has always been a tradition, FBI background checks on various potential nominees for key cabinet positions. Do you think that's going to continue?

TOMLINSON: It may. I mean, he's expressed great skepticism of the FBI. So, it's no surprise that he would also be rejecting some of the background checks. I can see a world in which senators insist on the background checks from the FBI, and then it's coupled with the background checks that have been done by private companies that he has paid for, for a lot of these folks. That seems to be a happy compromise that I could see going forward, because I don't think that we can completely forego the FBI checks, but I can see Donald Trump wanting a check on that.

BLITZER: Jasmine, if they would have done FBI checks, maybe they wouldn't be having all this controversy right now about some of these potential nominees.

WRIGHT: But I think for Donald Trump, controversy is the point, right? That is what he campaigned on for the last two years, that is the mandate that he believes that the American people gave to him. I was talking to one person who feels that they know Trump very well, and they basically said that this is not a kind of sacrificial lamb theory or game theory that he's doing. He's putting the people that he wants in office. This is a very straightforward process.

And, yes, maybe some of them won't get in, I actually think that maybe only one person may not get in because of the pressure on Senate Republicans, but these are the people who you want to see in these positions to controversially make a big splash and tear down the interest that he do not believe serve him and serve the American people.

CALDWELL: And there's also the thing that Donald Trump would probably himself not pass a background check, if you were in the same position. So, that is not a requirement or something that is important to Donald Trump. He wants the people, as Jasmine said, the people who are most loyal to him and who will do exactly what he wants to do.

HAYS: I don't think we should forget that some of these background checks from the FBI also lead into their security clearances. And if they can't pass the background check to get confirmed, are they still going to get security clearances? I think we should start thinking about those people getting those as well.

BLITZER: Security clearances, very important, especially for someone who wants to be the secretary of defense or the FBI director.

HAYS: More like Tulsi Gabbard for DNI, right?

BLITZER: Yes, security clearance, a good point. All right guys, thank you very, very much.

Just ahead, the growing divide among Republicans on Matt Gaetz with House Speaker Mike Johnson making news today over whether to release a House ethics report. We'll talk with one lawmaker who will be a key part of the attorney general confirmation process, a member of the Judiciary Committee, there you see him, Delaware Senator Chris Coons. He's standing by live.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:15:00]

BLITZER: Tonight, the House speaker, Mike Johnson, is pushing back on calls for the House Ethics Committee to release its investigation into Donald Trump's pick for attorney general, Matt Gaetz, who just stepped down from Congress. Johnson saying such a move would, in his words, be a, quote, terrible breach of precedent. Even as some Republican senators are asking to see the findings.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): If someone is no longer a member of Congress, we're not in the business of investigating and publishing report and people who are not part of this institution. House Ethics Committee's jurisdiction is over sitting members of Congress.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Let me get some more from Democratic Senator Chris Coons, who's joining us right now. He's a key member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senator, thanks so much for joining us.

I know you've called the Gaetz pick, in your words, a deadly, serious challenge to the U.S. Senate. Do you have any sense that your Republican colleagues are willing to stand up to Trump on this issue?

SEN. CHRIS COONS (D-DE): Well, if we're going to have to see, many of them have expressed concern. Many of them privately have expressed shock, even discussed given Congressman Gaetz reputation and the nearly released House Ethics report, which is believed to contain details about personal misconduct and character flaws. Let's remember, we're not talking about a reality T.V. show here. We're talking about the U.S. Department of Justice, which he's been nominated to lead, an agency that has 115,000 employees in every state in the union, and a budget of more than $60 billion dollars, and is responsible for fighting terrorism, fighting crime, keeping us safe, implementing a wide range of federal criminal laws.

And I understand that President-elect Trump did win the election. He has a mandate. And, typically, a president is entitled to his picks for his cabinet. But the Constitution gives to the Senate an advice and consent rule, which means where there are nominees that Republicans and Democrats find they can work with, we should confirm them. When there are folks who have the character, the experience of the relevant capabilities, we should confirm them. But where there are profound questions about their capabilities and their ethics, we should hesitate or stop them from being confirmed.

I'll remind you, it just takes 50 votes now in the Senate to confirm someone for the cabinet. So, if President Trump is demanding recess appointments, what's that mean about his confidence that he can get the 53 Republican senators in the next Congress to confirm his cabinet picks?

BLITZER: But, Senator, can you compel the House Ethics Committee, while Democrats still control the Senate, to release its report about Gaetz over Speaker Johnson's objections?

[18:20:02]

COONS: I don't know that. I don't see a way that we could compel them from the Senate to the House. But I do think we could insist on a thorough FBI background check and access to those documents.

So, I can imagine a path forward where whatever is in that report is made available to the FBI, and they provide not the report, but some of the core facts and findings to us in a classified setting so that the members of the Judiciary Committee know what we're looking at.

That typically happens when we have a confirmation hearing, for example, for a justice of the Supreme Court, or for a very senior law enforcement official. I'll remind you, the attorney general of the United States is the most senior law enforcement official in the entire U.S. government and has an absolutely critical role.

BLITZER: Important point. As you know, many Democrats have called former Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, Trump's pick to be the next Director of National Intelligence, a threat to U.S. national security. If you agree, what specifically do you see is the danger of her in that role?

COONS: Well, the challenges here are that former Congresswoman Gabbard has engaged -- she's appeared on Russian television on R.T. She's gone and visited Bashar al-Assad, the dictator of Syria, and she has repeated Russian propaganda. And there are some reasons to believe that she might compromise American intelligence and sources and methods. That's something that I would expect. The intelligence committee would look at in great detail. We can't have someone who can't clear a background check entrusted with America's crown jewels of our intelligence services.

And the director of National Intelligence is responsible for the president's daily briefing for coordinating intelligence materials across all of our different intelligence agencies and for the proper functioning and coordination of our intelligence community and decision-making around our national security.

I'll remind you, Wolf, that there are other nominees who've been put forward by President-elect Trump, like my colleague in the Senate, Senator Marco Rubio, who will get a decent fair hearing in the Senate, who fit the more traditional mold of folks who are qualified, but by their experience with classified material on the Intelligence Committee, with foreign policy on the Foreign Relations Committee, on which Senator Rubio and I have served together for many years.

I am not steadfastly opposed to confirming any Trump nominee. I may well support Senator Rubio if nominated and if we have a confirmation hearing. But the folks we're talking about, Tulsi Gabbard and Matt Gaetz, have obvious flaws in terms of a lack of senior management capability, a lack of subject matter expertise, and likely a lack of the character required to handle such critical national security roles in the next administration.

BLITZER: Marco Rubio is expected to be nominated to become secretary of state. We'll see how that unfolds, as you correctly point out.

Senator Chris Coons, I appreciate having you. Thank you so much.

COONS: Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: And coming up, new CNN reporting tonight on Donald Trump's plans for revenge against Americans he sees as enemies, and how his cabinet picks are planning to make it a reality.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:25:00]

BLITZER: President-elect Donald Trump is quickly filling out his next administration with loyalists, a sign he's looking to make good on his vow to retaliate against his perceived political enemies.

CNN's Sara Murray has a closer look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT-ELECT: I am your retribution. I am your retribution.

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): For President- elect Donald Trump and his allies, the sweet taste of victory could come with an even sweeter chaser, revenge.

TRUMP: The Biden crime family. Liz Cheney is a stupid war hawk.

The FBI and the Justice Department have become vicious monsters.

MURRAY: Trump believes, without evidence, the Justice Department unfairly targeted him when he left the White House. Now, the list of perceived enemies stretches from political foes to those who investigated him to senior civil servants in the federal government.

TRUMP: Well, revenge does take time, I will say that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It does.

TRUMP: And sometimes revenge can be justified.

MURRAY: The president-elect's taste for vengeance has been echoed by his allies and advisers, like his pick for Attorney General, former Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz.

FMR. REP. MATT GAETZ (R-FL): We either get this government back on our side or we defund and get rid of, abolish the FBI, CDC, ATF, DOJ, every last one of them, if they do not come to heel.

MURRAY: Retribution also top of mind for right wing podcaster Steve Bannon in this conversation with Kash Patel, who's being floated for a role in the next administration.

STEVE BANNON, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE ADVISER: Do you feel confident that you will be able to deliver the goods, that we can have serious prosecutions and accountability?

PATEL: We will go out and find the conspirators, not just in government, but in the media. We're going to come after you. Whether it's criminally or civilly, we'll figure that out.

MURRAY: For Trump, there are multiple paths for payback. He's already floated special counsels to look into his political foes.

TRUMP: I will appoint a real special prosecutor to go after the most corrupt president in the history of the United States of America, Joe Biden, and the entire Biden crime family.

MURRAY: Last time he was president, he pressed the Justice Department to pursue specific investigations. During this campaign, he's rattled off a long list of potential targets.

[18:30:00]

TRUMP: The laptop is from Russia, they said. And they should be prosecuted for what they did.

She should be prosecuted. Nancy Pelosi should be prosecuted.

MURRAY: A second path to retribution is through a fully Republican Congress. Trump's political allies could investigate his perceived enemies. REP. JIM JORDAN (R-OH): We want the information we think the American people are entitled to.

MURRAY: Will Jack Smith be called to testify?

JORDAN: We'll have to see.

MURRAY: Trump's allies also frequently discuss a third avenue, gutting senior levels of the federal government, particularly in law enforcement and intelligence agencies.

MICHAEL FLYNN, FORMER TRUMP NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Those people have to be eliminated. I mean, taken out at the knees, you know, dismissed, take their clearances away, take their badges away.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to be the person that crushes the deep state.

MURRAY: Whether all these fiery threats translate into true retribution is an open question, but Trump's potential targets are already making plans. Some are exploring citizenship abroad. Others are weighing their next career steps with an eye toward jobs that offer fatter paychecks in the event they need to hire their own attorneys. And they might, if people like Steve Bannon get their way.

BANNON: The hunted are going to become the hunters.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MURRAY (on camera): Now, Wolf, we just don't know how much of this is going to turn out to be charged political rhetoric or how much Donald Trump, when he's back in the White House, is going to want to go after his political enemies or the people who have investigated him perhaps in criminal cases. But we do know that we see his allies out there continuing to sort of bang this drum, that this is an opportunity for Donald Trump to get retribution. And if you have someone like Matt Gaetz leading the Justice Department, if you have someone like Kash Patel leading the FBI, you're very well positioned to run those investigations, Wolf.

BLITZER: All right. Sara Murray reporting for us, thank you, Sara, very much. Let's get some analysis right now from CNN Security Correspondent Josh Campbell and CNN National Security Analyst Beth Sanner.

Beth, hearing the way Trump is installing these loyalists and threatening revenge, how ominous is this?

BETH SANNER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: You know, when I think about the role of these institutions in our society, it really is about trust with the American people and as well as with the rest of the government and our partners overseas. And you get that through integrity.

And, you know, I think we have to acknowledge that we do have a trust deficit among the American people regarding the FBI, for example. But the way to fix that trust is not to put someone in who is talking about retribution, because, otherwise, you just kind of flip, you know, who's on the trust deficit. You know, the FBI, the motto there is about protecting the American people, upholding the Constitution, same with the intelligence community. We all swear an oath to the Constitution. And I really believe a majority of Americans want it to be that way. So, I find this rather alarming.

BLITZER: Yes, an important point. Josh, you were an FBI special agent for years. What's been the reaction to Kash Patel potentially leading the FBI? What impact could that have on national security?

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, so much of the frustration inside the FBI comes from the fact that, you know, so many of these attacks on the organization, as officials there tell us, we were founded on a bedrock of disinformation. You know, the FBI's initial investigation in the Trump world didn't start with some foreign dossier. It started because four people in Trump's orbit had these sketchy ties to the Russians, one of which was bragging about having some kind of insight reportedly into the Russians hacking of the DNC.

And so as it relates to Kash Patel himself, I'm hearing two things. The first comes down to a question of independence. You know, I served under three FBI directors for decades before that. There was always this distance between the White House and the FBI, because this is an agency with incredible powers. And so there is a real question about someone like Kash Patel, who has reportedly spread numerous conspiracy theories about the FBI, whether he will maintain that distance.

And then the second question comes down to the future of the FBI itself. This has people there concerned. I'll let people in on a secret here. You know, there are 38,000 people inside the FBI other than maybe a handful in Washington. None of those people wake up each day thinking about the FBI director. They put their head down, they do their work, they solve their cases. And all of those people know that if anyone in leadership were to tell them to do something unethical or illegal, they could scream from the rooftops without fear of retribution.

It's important here because we're now hearing rumors that Trump could change the federal hiring processes to perhaps clear out and fire people at will inside the FBI and install his own political loyalists. That would obviously threaten the independence and potentially turn the most powerful law enforcement agency in the world into the private investigative arm of one person.

BLITZER: Yes, that would be horrible if that happened. Beth, as the former deputy director of National Intelligence, you've said Tulsi Gabbard taking the top job director of National Intelligence would be very, very dangerous.

[18:35:03]

Senator Coons just told me he believes she might even compromise top secret U.S. intelligence sources and methods.

What do you fear if Tulsi Gabbard were to take office?

SANNER: Well, a couple of things. You know, in the statute, it says that the DNI has access to all intelligence collected by every part of the intelligence community. It also says that the DNI has the responsibility for safeguarding that and that person is responsible for delivering timely, objective and information intelligence that is not politically motivated. And it's right in the statute. And all of those things I think are really, you know, a real question.

I think the SSCI is going to have some very hard questions, for example, you know, why did she co-sponsor legislation with Matt Gaetz that was to end, remove the criminal prosecution against Edward Snowden, who is the biggest leaker of the most sensitive information ever and now is living in Moscow on the dime of Vladimir Putin? You know, why would you do that when you, in this job, would be supposed to be prosecuting and protecting intelligence?

So, I think that there are real questions about that, as Senator Coon's raised.

BLITZER: Yes. Beth Sanner and Josh Campbell, to both of you, thank you very, very much.

And just ahead, breaking news just coming in to CNN right now from Donald Trump's transition team, including his choice for White House press secretary, we're going to tell you who that might be right after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:40:00]

BLITZER: Breaking news just coming into The Situation Room, Donald Trump has picked Karoline Leavitt to be his White House Press Secretary. This comes as we're getting new information about Trump's defense secretary choice, Pete Hegseth.

I want to bring back CNN's Kristen Holmes for more on what's going on. What are you learning, Kristen?

HOLMES: Yes. It's not just about Hegseth, but it's also how the transition is responding to these allegations against Hegseth. My colleague, Kaitlan Collins, and I are learning that they were surprised when they were informed this week about those sexual assault allegations against Hegseth. Some sources close to the transition, close to Donald Trump, telling us that, essentially, his nomination came together so quickly, there was little to know actual internal vetting when it came to Hegseth.

Now, these allegations actually led to Susie Wiles, the head of the transition, having a phone call on Thursday with Hegseth, questioning him about the allegations and asking if there was anything else that the team needed to know about before they moved forward.

Now, source that I talked to insisted that despite these allegations, that Donald Trump, that the transition was sticking by Hegseth's nomination. Just a reminder, one of the things that we had reported on was how sources close to Donald Trump, actually, some of them didn't even know that Hegseth was in consideration to be the secretary of defense.

So, right now, they say they are sticking with him amid these sexual assault allegations, but it is clearly a rocky start for Hegseth to lead one of the biggest departments and most critical departments in the upcoming Trump administration, Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes, secretary of defense, that's a critically important job. Kristen Holmes, thank you very much.

Just ahead, how one billionaire has wrestled his way into Donald Trump's inner circle and is using his unprecedented access to influence the president-elect and world leaders.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:46:54]

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Tonight, two Democratic senators are asking federal authorities to investigate Elon Musk's contacts with Russia. The tech billionaire holds a security clearance and has defense contracts with the Pentagon.

Brian Todd has a closer look at Musk and his growing influence inside the Trump transition.

Brian, for the moment, musk seems to be enjoying his new role as first buddy.

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: He's enjoying it, Wolf, to the extent of almost never leaving the president elect side. Elon musk is positioning himself as almost a de facto member of Trump's family. The question now is, could that start to wear a little thin?

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT-ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: Take over, Elon! Yes, take over!

TODD (voice-over): Elon Musk, the billionaire new best friend of Donald Trump, has been such a constant presence with the president- elect in recent days that Trump joked about it at Mar-a-Lago.

TRUMP: I can't get him out of here. He just likes this place.

TODD: When musk flew to Washington with Trump this week on Trump's private plane and attended a meeting with House Republicans, Trump joked, I cant get rid of him.

MARGARET TALEV, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: He also has more proximity to president-elect Trump right now than Trump's running mate J.D. Vance.

TODD: Musk, who's been tapped by Trump to co-lead a new Department of Government Efficiency, has, according to sources who spoke to CNN's Kaitlan Collins, been omnipresent with Trump at Mar-a-Lago since the election, exerting enormous influence over the president-elect, dining with Trump, hanging out at the golf course with the Trump family.

When the Trumps were posing for family photos like this one the day after the election, the president-elect encouraged Musk and his young son X to be included.

TRUMP: We have to get Elon with his boy.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Absolutely.

TODD: Trump's granddaughter, Kai Trump, posting a photo with a caption, Elon achieving uncle status.

MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Maybe one thing that attracts Elon Must to Donald Trump and Donald Trump to Elon Musk is that they're kind of the same person. They like being the one person in the room, they like walking into a room and sucking all the oxygen out of it.

TODD: Following this comment from CNN analyst Gloria Borger --

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: I think Musk is becoming like first buddy.

TODD: Musk posted, quote, I'm happy to be the first buddy.

Musk has sat in on Trump's post election phone calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other leaders, posted this photo from Mar-a-Lago after meeting with Argentina's there.

And according to "The New York Times", Musk met with Iran's ambassador to the U.N. He's also weighed in on staffing decisions. But is Musk overextending with Trump's inner circle? "The New York Times" reports that one recent evening, Musk walked into the dining room at Mar-a- Lago, about 30 minutes after Trump did and received a similar standing ovation to the president elect.

TALEV: There is some conventional wisdom if you followed the first Trump presidency which is that if you begin to overshadow the principal, it usually ends quite badly.

TODD: Then there's the matter of the enormous power Musk could have with his new portfolio. Musk's companies face multiple federal investigations, some of them by agencies whose budgets he might be able to cut.

RONAN FARROW, INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALIST, THE NEW YORKER: He's now positioning himself to have potential oversight of the agencies that are investigating him. That would be an unprecedented level of conflict of interest.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[18:50:02] TODD (on camera): No matter when or how this high powered partnership between Elon Musk and Donald Trump ends, Musk seems to have already benefited from it financially. It's been reported that since Trump's election victory, Musk has gotten about $70 billion richer on paper, much of that due to Tesla's stock skyrocketing -- Wolf.

BLITZER: $70 billion. All right, Brian, thank you very, very much.

Also tonight, Public health experts are sounding the alarm over Donald Trump's selection of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as health secretary despite his embrace of rather outlandish conspiracy theories and junk science.

Let's discuss with the director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Dr. Paul Offit.

Dr. Offit, thank you so much for joining us.

I know as a vaccine expert, and you are one of the best, you're particularly concerned about RFK, Jr. leading the nation's health policy. He says he wouldn't take away vaccines, but explain -- explain why his skepticism alone is so dangerous.

DR. PAUL OFFIT, DIRECTOR, VACCINE EDUCATION CENTER, Well, it's not skepticism. It's cynicism. I would argue that that I'm a vaccine skeptic, that everybody who sits around the table at the FDA Vaccine Advisory Committee is a skeptic.

Show us the data. Prove a vaccine is safe. Prove it's effective.

He's not a skeptic. He's a cynic. He doesn't believe the data. You can show him reams of data and he still doesn't believe it. He says that vaccines cause autism even though dozens of studies say that it doesn't.

He said that that the polio vaccine has killed more people than it saved. He said that no vaccine is beneficial, even though vaccines have caused us to live 30 years longer than we did 100 years ago.

What do you do with the science denialists? I think what you don't do is you don't put them in charge of an agency that's science based.

BLITZER: The Hawaii governor, Josh Green, spoke to CNN about helping combat a 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa that killed 89 children, that he blames RFK Jr. for that. I want you to watch and listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. JOSH GREEN, MD (D), HAWAII: We saw dead children. We saw the remnants of that anti-vax campaign by RFK and his and his organization. We -- we saw devastation.

He scared the wits out of everybody in Samoa. There was a lot of health literacy issues. They did not have all the information. If he becomes HHS secretary, you can expect that in America, too.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BLITZER: Would you expect more deadly disease outbreaks if RFK Jr. were to get that very, very serious appointment? What could that look like?

OFFIT: It's certainly something one fears. I mean, the Samoa stories is an excellent one because what he did was he kept beating the drum, that measles vaccine was killing children in Samoa. He went to Samoa, he met with the president.

He wrote letters. He met with anti-vaccine activists. Immunization rates dropped precipitously. The following year, there were 5,600 cases of measles and 83 deaths, mostly in children less than four.

That's what disinformation can do. And Samoa is a small island nation of 200,000 people. We have a country of 300 million people. Imagine what that kind of science denialism and disinformation can do on a much larger scale.

BLITZER: Many Americans seem to be drawn to RFK Jr.'s calls to reform food and drug standards. Are there some parts of his broader message that you might agree with?

OFFIT: Sure. No, when he talks about (INAUDIBLE) or making sure that we diet and we eat better foods and that we exercise so we can decrease the rate of -- rates of obesity or type two diabetes in this country, and the consequences that follow those -- those disorders, fine. Let's talk about that.

I mean, I'm old enough to remember the president's council on physical fitness when I was younger. Let's do that. But please stay away from his science denialism, anti-vaccine activism, and conspiracy theories.

BLITZER: Dr. Paul Offit, thank you so much for joining us.

And coming up, there's breaking news coming in right now on Rudy Giuliani and whether he's met today's deadline to hand over possessions to two election workers he defamed.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:58:32]

BLITZER: Breaking news, we're getting new details on today's deadline for Rudy Giuliani to turn over some of his most valuable assets to the two Georgia election workers he defamed.

I want to bring in CNN's senior crime and justice reporter Katelyn Polantz.

Katelyn, tell us what you're learning.

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: Wolf, the classic Mercedes, it's been delivered in Florida. The watches, 26 of them, they've been FedExed. And the money in a bank account that Rudy Giuliani has that also is being sent at this time to Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, those two Georgia election workers to whom he owes $150 million.

This is a moment where those debts are beginning to fully be paid. They have been chasing Giuliani for a year to try and get assets like these of his. They are still trying to take control so they can sell a $6 million apartment he has in New York, and there's still a fight over World Series rings and a condo in Florida as well.

There's other stuff that Giuliani is also getting to Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss.

But, Wolf, it is a significant moment of the fall of the former mayor of New York, the former Man of the Year for "Time" magazine because of the consequences for his work for Donald Trump after the 2020 election. Yet, Wolf, he is still in the fold of Donald Trump politically, Rudy Giuliani said in a court filing when he his attorney announced he was turning over these things that he does plan on attending Donald Trump's inauguration in January.

BLITZER: All right. We'll see if that happens. Let's see if he attends.

All right. Katelyn Polantz, thank you very, very much.

And to our viewers, thanks very much for watching. I'm Wolf Blitzer in THE SITUATION ROOM.

"ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT" starts right now.