Return to Transcripts main page
The Situation Room
Trump to Deploy 2,000 More National Guard Members to L.A.; California Sues the Trump Administration; RFK Jr. Forces Out CDC Vaccine Advisory Committee Members; At Least 9 People Dead at School Shooting at Austria. Aired 10:30-11a ET
Aired June 10, 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 ANCHOR: What's your response to that?
EVA BITRAN, DIRECTOR OF IMMIGRANTS' RIGHTS, ACLU OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA: Every law enforcement officer out in the streets of the United States, whether state, federal, or military, is bound by the Constitution, they must respect First Amendment rights, they must respect Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights against excessive force, and we and others will be holding them to it.
BLITZER: The union leader out there, David Huerta, was arrested during Friday's protests before being released yesterday. Here's some of what he says he saw during his detention. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAVID HUERTA, PRESIDENT, SERVICE EMPLOYEES INTERNATIONAL UNION CALIFORNIA: In there, they're in lockdown right now. They're in lockdown. They cannot come out of their cells, not even to eat. They cannot come out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who's they?
HUERTA: The detainees. They cannot come out. So, while this is happening, they cannot come out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: Are you hearing the same thing?
BITRAN: We are. I spoke with someone with an immigrant who was detained from Monday to late Thursday in the federal building in a room with metal benches, with no hot food, with no access to menstrual products, with no access to water, only little juice boxes, with food every 14 hours, completely overcrowded. This is what we're hearing. This is how we understand that the federal government is treating people they're detaining.
BLITZER: Eva Bitran, thank you very much for joining us.
BITRAN: Thanks, Wolf, for your time,
BLITZER: Pamela.
PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Still ahead, Wolf, restoring trust in vaccines. Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. says he's trying to do that by gutting the CDC Vaccine Advisory Committee. What that means moving forward up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:35:00]
BROWN: Happening now, Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. is making some controversial moves at the Health Department. Kennedy, a vaccine skeptic, is claiming it's all to restore public trust in vaccines. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed Kennedy announced he is removing and replacing all 17 members of an expert panel of vaccine advisers. Kennedy claims the group is, quote, "plagued" with conflicts of interest.
So, let's bring in CNN Medical Correspondent Meg Tirrell to understand what this all means. Meg, you know, Kennedy has made this clean sweep of this expert vaccine panel. What will be the biggest impact of this?
MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Pamela, what I'm hearing from folks both on the panel and externally in the public health world is that they're concerned that particularly physicians who are the most trusted advisers in -- especially for parents deciding whether to vaccinate their kids, that physicians won't have this trusted panel that's been around since 1964 to depend on, to go to understand what the recommendations are for vaccines and perhaps an external source may need to be established to provide that kind of trusted guidance.
This is the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices or the ACIP. This is this expert group of outside advisers to the CDC that meets in public and makes recommendations. All of their conflicts of interest are all stated and occasionally, they recuse themselves if there is something that's considered an issue. But folks that I've talked with said that these folks are extremely well vetted. This is a group of doctors, infectious disease researchers and pediatricians all now getting dismissed.
One public health person I spoke with, Dr. Michael Osterholm, called the idea that RFK Jr. who has spread distrust in vaccines himself is doing this in order to restore public trust. He said that's like the arsonist complaining about fires in the neighborhood.
And, Pamela, we should also point out that maintaining this specific committee was a promise that Senator Bill Cassidy said RFK Jr. made to him when he voted for him. Take a listen to this speech he made in February about it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. BILL CASSIDY (R-LA): It confirmed, he'll maintain the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices recommendations without changes. (END VIDEO CLIP)
TIRRELL: Now, Cassidy posting on X yesterday that, of course, now the fear is the ACIP will be filled up with people who know nothing about vaccines except suspicion. He says, I've spoken with Secretary Kennedy and I'll continue to talk with him to ensure this is not the case. We'll see what that means, Pamela.
But HHS is saying this committee is still planning to meet at the end of June. We don't know who the members are going to be. We'll have to see if they can actually put it together in the next 15 days.
BROWN: I know you'll be watching it. Meg Tirrell, thanks so much. Wolf.
BLITZER: All right. We're joined now by the Dean of the Brown University School of Public Health Dr. Ashish Jha. He's also the former White House COVID-19 response coordinator. Dr. Jha, thanks so much for joining us. As you know, RFK Jr. is an outspoken vaccine skeptic. He claims he wants to restore the public's trusted vaccines with this latest move. What's your reaction?
DR. ASHISH JHA, DEAN, BROWN UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH AND FORMER WHITE HOUSE COVID-19 RESPONSE COORDINATOR: First of all, Wolf, thanks for having me back. And look, what he said in his op-ed was there's a series of nonsense about a group of individuals experts, as we heard in that report, who shape what vaccines, if any, are going to be available to the American people. So, obviously, this is very concerning. We'll have to see who he appoints next. But this is a step in the wrong direction.
BLITZER: You posted on social media, and I'm quoting now from your post, quote, "The scientific expert advisers he fired were among the nation's best. This is part of his effort to limit access to vaccines for America's kids," close quote. What do you think is Kennedy's end goal with these latest moves?
DR. JHA: Yes. So, we do have to look at this move in a broader context, right? We have the worst measles outbreak of the last 25 years, and he has been very non-committal about promoting vaccines to end that outbreak. We've obviously -- he's raising issues about autism, that settled signs we know vaccines don't cause autism.
[10:40:00]
Then you put this in the middle of all of that, and what you have is a pretty clear picture that what Secretary Kennedy's trying to do is make sure that vaccines are not readily available to Americans, not just you know, for kids, for the elderly, he could go pretty far with this move, and I really am worried about where we're heading.
BLITZER: In his op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, RFK Jr. wrote this, and I'm quoting, "Without removing the current members, the current Trump administration would not have been able to appoint a majority of new members until 2028," close quote. Is that how science and these advisory panels are supposed to work? DR. JHA: No. Wolf, we've never had administrations worry about who's -- as long as the people are qualified. Look, when the Biden administration came in, almost all of the appointees had come from the first Trump administration. That was fine because they were good people. They were experts. Right now, it's the same thing. The people he's firing are experts, like a nurse in Illinois who spent her entire career getting kids vaccinated, cancer doctors from Memorial Sloan Kettering. Like these are really good people. And generally, CDC has not worried about when were they appointed, the question is, are they good and are they conflict free?
BLITZER: Hundreds of employees beyond all of this over at the National Institutes of Health have signed a scathing public letter, a public letter accusing the Trump administration of endangering people's health and politicizing research. Do you agree with that?
DR. JHA: Yes. I mean, those -- I feel for those scientists who have to live under this. We are clearly seeing a politicization of science that is nothing like anything I've seen in my lifetime. We're seeing a gutting of the relationship we've had between NIH and our academic medical centers and research universities that lead to new treatments and cures, and it's great to see those scientists speaking up. I hope (unintelligible) is listening to them and is going to respond.
BLITZER: And very quickly before I let you go, Dr. Jha, do you fear that young kids, children could be endangered by these latest moves involving vaccines?
DR. JHA: No doubt, Wolf. Look, kids rely on vaccines. I'm worried about whether the next generation of kids are going to have access to polio vaccines and measles vaccines. That's where we're heading. That's what we have to push back against.
BLITZER: All right. Dr. Ashish Jha of Brown University, thank you so much for joining us. Pamela.
DR. JHA: Thank you.
BROWN: All right. Wolf, coming up right here in the Situation Room, at least nine people are dead in a school shooting in Austria. The breaking details up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:45:00]
BLITZER: Happening overnight, officials in Ukraine now say Russia launched another massive attack of some 315 drones across the country. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the strikes amounted to one of the largest attacks on the capitol city of Kyiv. Officials say a maternity ward in the southern part of the City of Odessa was also hit. The overnight strikes come just a day after Russia unleashed a record number of 479 drone strikes on Ukraine.
BROWN: And happening right now, activist Greta Thunberg has arrived in Paris after leaving Israel. She's part of a group of activists who departed Israel today. Israel intercepted an unsanctioned aid ship that was headed for Gaza. The group was attempting a symbolic delivery of assistance to highlight the food crisis inside Gaza. They accused Israel of attacking them in international waters.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GRETA THUNBERGM, ACTIVIST: I did not recognize that I entered the country illegally. I made it very clear in my testimony that we were kidnapped on international waters and brought there against our own will, into Israel.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: Israel says it was following international law. Several of the activists remain in Israel and are expected to be deported. Wolf.
BLITZER: Also knew this morning, nine people are dead and 12 students were injured after a school shooting in Austria.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: Authorities say the 21-year-old gunman died by suicide. They say he acted alone and was a former student at the school. CNN's Fred Pleitgen has the details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Austrian police say that they got first called around 10:00 a.m. local time that apparently shots had been fired in that school in Graz, which is the second largest city in the south of Austria.
Now, in the end, several people have been confirmed to have been killed and the Austrian police are saying that the shooter is also among those who are dead Now, there were videos of people apparently being evacuated from that building. Obviously, the police on the scene for an extended period of trying to get the situation under control, but also not clear whether or not there was one or two shooters. In the end, the police saying that they are now fairly confident that only one shooter perpetrated the school shooting at that school in Graz.
The Austrian authorities also saying that several people have been wounded. It's unclear how many and how severely these people are wounded. But of course, that community in Graz, in Austria, very much traumatized by these events and the Austrian leadership is already saying that this is one of the worst, if not the worst school shootings in the history of that country. Austria's president also offering his condolences as well.
Fred Pleitgen, CNN. Berlin.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[10:50:00]
BROWN: And our thanks to Fred. Coming up, the Justice Department says it has nine open cases connected to the protests in Los Angeles. So, why is the DOJ getting involved in cases normally left up to the states to handle? We'll ask our legal expert up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Man, this one to center field. Denzel Clarke on the move back after he stepped towards the plate, he makes another catch.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, my God.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Back-to-back weeks where he wins the electric play of the week and he's already --
(END VIDEO CLIP) ' BROWN: OK. That's amazing. Oh, my goodness. It is only June, but that may very well be the catch of the year. What do you think, Wolf?
BLITZER: Yes, I definitely think so. Oh, my God indeed. For more, I want to go to right now to CNN's Andy Scholes in Atlanta. Andy, a standout play for the last place Athletics. It's so nice to see them have something to cheer for.
[10:55:00]
ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: Yes. They don't get to smile much these days, right? Those A's fans. But Denzel Clarke -- I mean, he's had some unreal catches this season, but last night catch of the year. I mean, I personally think it's one of the best catches I've ever seen. I mean, he is just tracked the ball perfectly. Yes. And then, he said he did what the ball told him to do. And I guess that was just climb the wall and reach a good five feet over and grab it.
The A's, they did lose that game, seven to four, and have one of the worst records in baseball. But I mean, look at him, reach over that fence, just incredible. At least the fans get to keep watching Denzel Clarke make amazing plays this season. Can't wait to see what he has in store next.
All right. Meanwhile, in the Stanley Cup Final, it's getting chippy between Florida and Edmonton. These two, they went seven last year. First two games of the series went to overtime. They're getting kind of sick of each other, but Brad Marsh opened the scoring in game three for the Panthers, getting this goal just a minute into the game. And then the second, look at this hit by Aaron Ekblad on Connor McDavid as he was trying to weave his way through. Ouch. It was 4-1 Florida by the end of the second.
Then in the third, Oiler center Trent Frederic, he went after Sam Bennett with a crosscheck that broke his stick and then he just wanted to fight. Those two starts to scuffle. Everyone else starts exchanging blows out there on the ice. There were 140 penalty minutes doled out in this game. It was the fourth most in final history. Florida would end up winning in a blowout, 6-1, to take a 2-1 lead in this series. Game four of the series, guys, is going to be Thursday. You can watch it on TNT, stream it on Max. We'll see if Edmonton can get a win to even the series at two a piece.
I can't stop watching it though. Those those games between Florida and Edmonton certainly have been something.
BROWN: Absolutely. You've been watching?
BLITZER: My family in Florida is very happy.
BROWN: I'm sure they are. All right. Andy, thanks so much. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[11:00:00]
