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Trump Frustrated On Not Ending Russia-Ukraine War Quickly; Trump Sticking With Hegseth; Remembering Murdered 6M Plus Jews. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired April 25, 2025 - 10:30   ET

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

[10:30:00]

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: As the war in Ukraine drags on and on nearly 100 days into President Trump's term, sources now telling CNN he's privately conceded that ending the fighting has been much more difficult than he anticipated. I want to get reaction from CNN's Senior Political Analyst Ron Brownstein who's here with us today in the Situation Room.

Here's what Candidate Trump often said almost on a daily basis during the course of his campaign. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: If I'm president, I will have that war settled in one day, 24 hours. That is a war that's dying to be settled. I will get it settled before I even become president. Before I even arrive at the Oval Office shortly after we win the presidency, I will have the horrible war between Russia and Ukraine settled. I will have the horrible war between Russia and Ukraine settled. I will get it settled quickly. I will have the horrible war between Russia and Ukraine settled.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: We heard that during the campaign, as you remember, almost on a daily basis from Trump, it's now almost a hundred days he's been president of the United States, and the fighting there was more intense over the past few days than it's been in a long time.

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, first of all, it turns out if your secret plan to end the war is to essentially concede everything that Russia wants and to threaten your ostensible ally and force them to capitulate, that turns out to be the secret plan. You know, and you have Ukraine as well as the Europeans essentially saying, well, if that's your plan, you know, obviously, we can't accept that.

I think what he's seeing in Ukraine, I mean, he said similar things about a trade war with China, you know, as a candidate, it's so easy. No president ever stood up. All you have to do is stand up. I mean, the real world and the pushback that he's getting I think is very consistent across many of these fronts. But certainly here, what he's talking about is forcing our ally to capitulate to the demands of the invader. And that really isn't much of a deal. It's hard to even call that a deal. It's something else.

BLITZER: And he now says, he insists that all of those statements he made during the campaign about ending the war on day one were simply statements made in jest.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

BLITZER: His words.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes. Well, look, I mean, you know, Trump walks away from responsibility, you know, quite easily. But he can't walk away from responsibility on this, Wolf. And I think this is a case where beware of what you wish for.

You know, Trump has said -- the president has said that yesterday Russia's concession is that it give up taking over the whole country. Well, it can't take over the whole country as long as we continue to do what we have been doing. If we walk away, if we end all military aid, if we end all intelligence support, Russia may, in fact, make much further advances.

But Trump would not come out of that unscathed. You know, I mean, look at what happened to Joe Biden in Afghanistan in 2021 when his approval rating went under 50, it never came back. If there are scenes of chaos in Ukraine as a result of the U.S. walking away, I think it's pretty safe to predict that Trump will pay a price. Americans have no doubt who they want to see win this war.

And unlike the president, I think most Americans have no doubt about who started this war. So, if the U.S. walks away and Russia makes significant advances, I think it's very myopic for the White House to assume that they would be unscathed by that.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: And President Trump, you know, has rarely criticized Putin. He did yesterday in a rare rebuke. But in an interview that just came out from Time Magazine we've been talking about the president once again blamed Ukraine's NATO aspirations for starting the war. Criticized Zelenskyy. Why is he so much harsher on Zelenskyy than Putin, you think?

BROWNSTEIN: Well, that's the big question everyone's been asking for eight years. Why does he -- why is he so deferential to Putin in general? And we cycle through various theories. I think at one level, Trump does not accept the idea of allies and adversaries.

[10:35:00]

I mean, he looks at our allies essentially as -- our traditional allies as freeloaders, who are kind of mooching off the U.S. and has kind of an admiration for strong men around the world, whether it's Putin or Xi Jinping, and in some ways, sees them as more compatible with his vision of how the world should be ordered, kind of back to a 19th century great power spheres of influence. The great -- you remember, the class -- maybe the classic memoir ever about diplomacy was Dean Acheson, Henry -- Harry Truman's secretary of State. It was called "Present at the Creation" because he was there at the moment when all of the architecture of the post-War World was built.

I think, in many ways, what we're watching, particularly in these last few days, is that we are present at the destruction of that order, that international U.S.-led order that came out of World War II. The actions that Trump is taking is making it very clear that world simply doesn't exist. The Europeans understand it and I think Putin understands it. And it is just the end of an era where the U.S. was, Madeleine Albright said, the indispensable nation.

BLITZER: Good point. I was there in Moscow when the then-Soviets, Gorbachev signed the agreement ending the Soviet Union, giving independence, all the former republics of the Soviet Union, including Ukraine. And it was an optimistic moment that sadly has deteriorated over these years.

I want to get your thoughts while I have you, Ron, on this controversy surrounding the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth. What do you make of Trump sticking with him right now? And are there political risks that that carries?

BROWNSTEIN: Well, look, yes, there are risks, but I think he's sticking with him because I think Trump believes backing down in any way to critics particularly from the left and the media is a sign of weakness. In many ways, the fact that he has been able to prevent meaningful Republican complaint about Hegseth's behavior is a sign of just how strongly his foot is on the neck of the party.

I mean, it's just -- I mean, think about what Republicans in Congress were doing over Hillary Clinton's e-mails and now, you have a situation where he is sharing attack plans on, you know, unsecure -- through unsecure means.

The fact -- I look at this as a litmus test, as a canary in the coal mine of just how far he can push Republicans in Congress to accept things that they never imagined in the past that they would've had to. And at the moment, the answer is pretty darn far.

BLITZER: It's pretty amazing what's going on.

BROWN: Yes. All right. Ron Brownstein, thank you so much.

BROWNSTEIN: Thanks for having me.

BLITZER: And just ahead, preserving the memory of the Holocaust. That's the life's mission of my next guest. How that mission is more important now than ever as antisemitism here in the United States is increasing.

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[10:40:00]

BLITZER: Days of remembrance. So, this has been a very, very important week of honoring the 6 million Jews and millions of others murdered by the Nazis and the survivors who endured unspeakable horrors. My next guest has made it his life mission to ensure that no one forgets. Stuart Eizenstat is the chair of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, and a former U.S. Ambassador to the European Union.

Ambassador, thanks very much for joining us today. I know you helped draft the initial legislation authorizing the creation of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum here in Washington, to preserve and share firsthand accounts of what happened to the Jewish people and to others during the course of the Holocaust.

AMB. STUART EIZENSTAT, CHAIR, UNITED STATES HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL COUNCIL: Yes, Wolf, it's life coming full circle for me. I recommended the creation to President Carter of a presidential commission.

BLITZER: You were his chief domestic policy adviser.

EIZENSTAT: I was. And I recommended the creation of a presidential commission on the Holocaust headed by (INAUDIBLE). We frankly didn't know what they were going to remedy. It could have been a statue, but it was the museum. We passed the legislation, got the land donated. And now, life comes full circle as President Biden had appointed me to chair the museum.

BLITZER: You know, I grew up with these stories of the Holocaust in Buffalo, New York, where I grew up, but it was not that long ago I went to Auschwitz and I -- we got some video of walking around Auschwitz. I was there with our Dana Bash, and we -- it was a very powerful moment. The march of the living from Auschwitz to Birkenau. And we saw the crematorium, the gas chambers and all of that.

I had heard stories from my parents as a kid growing up, both my parents were Holocaust survivors, all four of my grandparents were killed during the course of the Holocaust. But if you see it there personally, it is so meaningful. I know you've been there as well.

EIZENSTAT: Yes. In fact, I remember your visit. But I had a very different upbringing. My father and both uncles were in World War II. We had a very Jewish home, but the Holocaust was never discussed. I never met a Holocaust survivor, to my knowledge. I had no courses in it in high school and college because none existed. And my epiphany came in 1968 when I was -- after a year in the Johnson White House, I was the research director for Hubert Humphrey's campaign against Richard Nixon, and I met someone named Arthur Morse, that was in only 25, and it was an explosive book that he had just written called "While Six Million Died."

And for the first time he had access to newly declassified Roosevelt records and it showed what President Roosevelt and his top a knew about the genocide of the Jews and failed to act on it. And that had a profound effect on me. I said, I want to remove that cloud as much as I can from the otherwise glorious history of the U.S. military in winning World War II. That led me to recommend the museum to do $8 billion of recoveries in the Clinton administration from Swiss and French banks and art recovery and insurance and so forth. And to continue that all the way through, including in the Trump administration.

[10:45:00]

BLITZER: And the work you've done is so, so important. I want to talk to you about a very disturbing rising tide of antisemitism here in the United States. As you know, according to the Anti-Defamation League, the ADL, there were a record number of incidents last year here in the U.S., more than 9,300 cases of assaults, harassment, and vandalism against American Jews. And there's been an increase of nearly 900 percent over the past decade alone. What do you believe is responsible for this?

BEIZENSTAT: When I was ambassador of the European Union, my late wife Fran and I went to around the European Union states, and we always could tell where the Jewish institutions were because there was a police escort there. There were guards, there were concrete barriers. And we used to say to ourselves in the 1990s, thank goodness we don't have to worry about this in the United States.

Now, there's almost no Jewish institution that doesn't have a garden. And I think that the reasons are manifold first when you have economic and technological dislocation, people feel that they're left behind. Jews are always the convenient target. It's the oldest conspiracy in history.

And second, I think it is a feeling that the anger that people have should be taken out on someone. Somehow the notion that Jews control institutions, control the money, all of which is false, but that is something that drives this antisemitism.

And you saw at Charlottesville t-shirts that said Jews will not replace us, as if there was some effort to do so. We are less than 2 percent of the population in this country. We're less than 1 percent of the total population in the world. In fact, Wolf, at the time of the outbreak of World War II in 1939 there were about 16 and a half million Jews in a world of 2 billion. Now, we've never recovered our numbers. We're about 15 million in a world of 8 billion.

So, this whole notion is false, but again, it's one that has been built up over generations. And when you have dislocations, it causes that kind of reaction.

BLITZER: And as you know, in this week's report the ADL also cited the increase of antisemitism on college campuses around the United States. What's -- what was your reaction to that part?

EIZENSTAT: Well, the college campus problem is very real. I've talked to people at both Columbia, at Emory, and my native Atlanta. I was supposed to give a talk at Brandeis, though the president was then dismissed after the faculty felt that he shouldn't have removed a pro- Hamas group.

So, I think that it's a real -- very real problem. We have to be careful in addressing it however in ways that don't lead to a blowback, that is to make sure that when universities are not doing what they should, they have a chance to repair their problem, to rectify it rather than just cut off all funding.

But one of the reasons that I think it's so important that we remember Pope Francis, is that he was a great advocate against Jewish hatred and for antisemitism when he was archbishop and then the later cardinal in Buenos Aires, he went to Israel as well. Visited Yad Vashem, visited -- the first pope to visit Theodor Herzl's grave, who's the father of Zionism. He was a tremendous friend of the Jewish world.

But for us at the Holocaust Museum, he did something remarkable in historic, Wolf. For 50 years, including two visits I made when I was in the Clinton administration to try to open the archives of the Vatican during World War II. Pope Pius XII archives.

He was the pope from 39 to 58, and we failed. Pope Francis, on his own, in 2019 said, we need to open it, and the church has no fear of history. So, he was willing to take that risk. We now have 500,000 pages of records and there's still another 16 million to look at, but this will give us the best idea of what Pope Pius and the church knew or did not know what they did, why they were silent, why they made pleas for people who were being damaged, but never mentioned Jews. And so, this will be a very important adjunct history.

And also, what happened after the war with the so-called rat lines. Did the church have any involvement? Now, nobody's making allegations, but at least we'll have now the documentary evidence, thanks to the heroic and really courageous decision of Pope Francis.

BLITZER: Pope Francis, a great friend of the Jewish people.

EIZENSTAT: Great friend.

BLITZER: May he rest in peace. May his memory be a blessing.

EIZENSTAT: Absolute.

BLITZER: Stuart Eizenstat, thanks very much for all the important work you do and I hope people when they come to Washington, go and visit the U.S. Holocaust Museum.

EIZENSTAT: Well, we have 50 million visitors, 90 percent or more are non-Jewish.

BLITZER: Interesting. All right. Thanks very much for all the good work. Appreciate it.

EIZENSTAT: Thank you.

BLITZER: And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:50:00]

BROWN: Well, the Tennessee Titans have a new franchise quarterback, Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter has a new home and the commissioner makes a surprise entrance. That was just day one of the NFL draft from Green Bay, Wisconsin.

BLITZER: CNN's Sports Anchor Andy Scholes is joining us right now what to expect on this day two, Andy. Some big surprises so far. What more do you anticipate?

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: Well, Wolf and Pam, you know, the big story coming today's second and third round is when will Shedeur Sanders end up getting drafted?

[10:55:00]

You know, it was a long night for Deion's son. He was hoping to hear his name called, but after all 32 picks he was still on the board last night. And he addressed his draft party in Texas after that first round.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHEDEUR SANDERS, FORMER COLORADO QUARTERBACK: All this is, is of course, fuel to the fire and under no circumstance, we all know this shouldn't happened, but we understand we on the bigger and better things. Tomorrow's the day. We're going to be happy regardless.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCHOLES: Yes. The New York Giants passing on Shedeur, not once but twice. They got Penn State Edge rusher Abdul Carter with the third pick. Then they traded back into the first round and took Ole Miss quarterback Jaxson Dart. Last time Giants won a Super Bowl, Eli Manning was their quarterback. Eli played at Ole Miss. So, apparently rebels, quarterbacks do well in the big apple.

Now, Texas offensive lineman Kelvin Banks, meanwhile, he was taken by the Saints with the ninth pick and he was just overcome with emotion watching with his family. That right there is what the draft is all about. And you see Banks', young son, Khalil, he's there on the bottom right? Well, he is gone viral because he threw up right after dad was drafted and the family was celebrating. I'm sure that's a moment the family's always going to mention to young Khalil as he grows up there. Little guy.

BROWN: And she's clapping and he is like, oh, my God.

SCHOLES: Too close to dinner time.

BROWN: Listen, as a mom of three, I know how that goes.

SCHOLES: Yes.

BLITZER: It's an exciting kid. All right. Thanks Andy Scholes. Thanks very, very much.

BROWN: And coming up at Situation Room, help alert. How declining childhood vaccination rates could mean millions more measles cases in the United States. We'll be back.

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