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The Situation Room
Why Are Men and Boys Falling Behind?; Most Watched CNN Videos of 2025. Aired 10:30-11a ET
Aired December 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]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Inflation is really taking a bite and you're making some very difficult financial decisions right now.
VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN BUSINESS AND POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: Higher earners are weathering higher prices by trading down in where they shop, like Walmart. That's propping up spending while lower income Americans are pulling back.
Number four, a shaky job market.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You can see how bumpy the ride has gotten recently. In fact, we now know that out of three out of the last six months, the economy has lost jobs.
YURKEVICH: The job market is slowing. June, August and October saw the first losses since the pandemic.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Uncertainty really is the theme for 2025. It's been a big driver for why the economy has slowed down over the course of the year and it is probably the blocker that is going to prevent hiring from picking up through the rest of the year.
YURKEVICH: Trump blamed the worse than expected job market on the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics firing her in August.
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: We had no confidence. I mean, the numbers were ridiculous.
YURKEVICH: He accused her without evidence of manipulating the monthly jobs reports for, quote, "political purposes."
Number three, the Fed acts.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We begin with our major breaking economic news. The Federal Reserve announcing its decision on whether to make its first interest rate cut this year and it's happening after months of pressure from President Trump.
YURKEVICH: Despite months of threats and taunts from President Trump, the Federal Reserve made the first of three rate cuts in September. The Fed held rates steady for nine straight months to assess how President Trump's tariff policy would impact jobs and inflation.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It does lower Fed rates to the lowest level in three year.
YURKEVICH: Interest rates affect what Americans pay for mortgages and other loans. Number two, Wall Street's roller coaster. Over a single year, the major U.S. indices lost nearly 20 percent in market value in the spring, then gained it back a few months later.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Stocks in a free fall. President Trump's decision to further escalate his trade war --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Wall Street closed last hour with the Dow above 48,000 for the very first time.
YURKEVICH: The market madness driven by the president's on and off tariff policy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lot of much bigger things are going on, namely A.I.
YURKEVICH: A.I. is fueling a technology boom and a boom on trading floors led by NVIDIA, whose market cap is approaching $5 trillion. But A.I.'s meteoric rise is fueling concerns of a bubble burst on the horizon.
And number one, the launch of a historic trade war.
TRUMP: This is one of the most important days, in my opinion, in American history. It's a declaration of economic independence.
YURKEVICH: With a signature on April 2nd, the United States entered a new era of trade policy, announcing steep tariffs on allies and enemies alike.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president declared a national economic emergency and that allows him to really launch what many see as an escalating trade war. This is a historic move.
YURKEVICH: That historic move, moving markets, sending countries scrambling for new trade deals with the U.S. and stoking concerns for business owners and customers.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: As a business owner, you always have uncertainty, but these are these are things we didn't plan for.
YURKEVICH: But the U.S. Supreme Court is getting ready to rule on whether Trump's tariffs are legal. A precedent setting ruling.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president clearly thinks that the stakes here are massive. He put up on Truth Social yesterday a post in which he said that this case presents literally life or death for our country.
YURKEVICH: Vanessa Yurkevich, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Wolf, what's happening right now?
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: You and me, happening now. So, we're not developing now? Not developing story, happening now story. It's not breaking news. It's just happening now.
BROWN: There you go, folks.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: 2025 has been a big year for us as we launched the Situation Room with the addition of my co-anchor and good friend, Pamela Brown.
BROWN: It really has been an honor being your co-anchor this year, Wolf. 20 years you've been with the Situation Room.
BLITZER: We created the Situation Room 20 years ago. I've been with CNN for 35 years.
BROWN: Amazing. And since I came on board this legendary show, we have covered an onslaught of breaking news, tackled hard-hitting interviews and also had some fun on and off camera. My favorite part actually has been the commercial break.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
All right. You all practice --
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BROWN: Well, we can do the bump. We also do thumb wars.
BLITZER: Yes. And I'm undefeated.
BROWN: And he says he's undefeated, but I actually did beat him one time. I just want to note that for the record, I have video proof.
BLITZER: You ready?
BROWN: Oh, God, should we do it?
BROWN AND BLITZER: 1, 2, 3, 4. I declare a thumb war.
BLITZER: Starting right now.
BROWN: Oh, gosh. Oh, gosh. I get so nervous. I get so nervous. Wait a second.
BLITZER: 1, 2, 3.
BROWN: So, undefeated still.
BLITZER: You got to count to three.
BROWN: OK, 1, 2, 3. It's because I didn't count to three. OK. Well, there you go, folks. I guess still undefeated.
BLITZER: That's a strong thumb. Very strong thumb.
[10:35:00]
BROWN: Some other rules I've learned here in the Situation Room is no schmutz.
BLITZER: No schmutz.
BROWN: Which is dirt in Yiddish, right?
BLITZER: No schmutz.
BROWN: No schmutz. We've learned about Wolf's golf game. He started playing golf this year, and he really enjoyed that.
BLITZER: I'm taking golf lessons once a week, and I'm really enjoying it. And I'm getting much better every time.
BROWN: And we did the Song of the Day, and today it was "Uptown Girl."
BLITZER: Uptown Girl. You've been living in my downtown world.
BROWN: So, we like to sing. We like to dance. We like to have fun. And you know what --
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BROWN: I didn't know that.
BLITZER: Go to Google and look it up and see it.
BROWN: OK. We're on it.
BLITZER: You'll see me do it in the dark.
BROWN: OK.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: Absolutely. And the best part, ask me this question. What's the best part of the Situation Room?
BROWN: What's the best part of the Situation Room?
BLITZER: Thank you very much for your question, Pamela. The best part is that we do serious important news, and our viewers rely on us to update them on what's going on, including what we call the breaking news. And I'm a news junkie. You're a news junkie. We wake up every morning. We look forward to reporting the news, and we're continuing to do so. And we learn a lot in the process. We get a little bit smarter after two hours of reporting the news than we were before.
BROWN: That's why I love this job. It's never boring. You learn something new every day, and you're just bringing the facts and the truth in a time when it really matters more than ever. BLITZER: And you have three little kids who watch, actually. And what did one of them tell you today?
BROWN: Oh, gosh. Wolf.
BLITZER: What?
BROWN: Well, I just had a birthday, and he pointed out that I had some wrinkles. So, you know -- but we cover it up with makeup, you know. But you've got to own the wrinkles. You know, you've got to own it all when you age.
BLITZER: I have some wrinkles too. It I have a beard, too, that covers up a lot of those wrinkles.
BROWN: Well, Wolf, you're still looking great. And we hope that everyone has a wonderful 2026. And that we'll continue to do what we love to do, wake up every morning and give you the news here in the Situation Room.
BLITZER: It's a great way to end the year. And Merry Christmas. Happy New Year. Let's hope it's going to be a great 2026 for all of us and for all of our viewers here in the United States and around the world. After the break, how a loosely connected social network known as the Manosphere is contributing to a decline of boys and men in American society.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:40:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAMION DEJESUS, U.S. AIR FORCE SENIOR AIRMAN: Hi, I'm Senior Airman DeJesus from Annapolis, Maryland. Deployed in the Middle East. Shout out to my friends, families, and co-workers. Happy holidays.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: Well, turning back to our series on the decline of boys and men with social scientist Richard Reeves, we are looking at the rise of influential figures and what's referred to as the manosphere.
That's a loosely connected network of social media communities focused on men and masculinity, sometimes associated with misogyny and anti- feminism. And it's a space that some podcasters and so-called influencers have capitalized on, arguing to listeners that masculinity is under attack by the Democratic Party and so-called cancel culture. Reeves helps us understand why it's taken off.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RICHARD REEVES, PRESIDENT, AMERICAN INSTITUTE FOR BOYS AND MEN: There's the manosphere, which could be defined as those of the misogynists. You know, the pick-up artists, the incels, involuntary celibates, who I think, if we're defining them by a clear ideology, which is, it's misogynist. It's anti-women, clearly. But then there's a whole bro-sphere, to call it.
BROWN: And that's where you see a Joe Rogan.
REEVES: Yes. You know, Theo Von, et cetera. There's a big, even some of the fitness influencers, right? Sometimes you -- some of the fitness influencers are included as part of the manosphere, right? Because it's men and they occasionally talk about masculinity. So, what I think is happening is that there's a real appetite among boys and young men to figure out how they should be in the world.
If they don't have that script about how to be in the world from say, their male teacher in front of them, or their father or the guys in the neighborhood, or their coach, or like, if there aren't enough men showing them how to be in the world as a man, they're going to go and find someone who will tell them.
BROWN: Like an Andrew Tate.
REEVES: Like an Andrew Tate. How should I be a man today? If we don't like Andrew Tate's misogynist answer to that, then we need a better answer to it. Because that is the question that a lot of boys and young men are taking now online. And someone like Andrew Tate gives him a very clear and prescriptive answer. It is also wrong and misogynist.
But if we don't want the wrong misogynist answers to the question of how should I be a man today to prevail, then we have got to come up with better answers. So, Andrew Tate and his followers, our -- that's our fault. It's not -- it's not the boys and young boys and young men desperately searching for an answer. Let's not be too quick to blame them. Let's actually ask ourselves why such a huge vacuum is being created that someone like Andrew Tate is able to fill.
So, when Andrew Tate came back to -- Megyn Kelly publicly denounced the move. Josh Hawley publicly denounced his return.
BROWN: Right.
REEVES: The Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, ordered his attorney general to investigate Andrew Tate to see if there was anything that they could charge him with on U.S. soil.
BROWN: Right.
REEVES: OK, MAGA celebrates? Well, only if you assume that none of those people possibly...
(CROSSTALK)
BROWN: Right.
REEVES: And so, just, again...
BROWN: You mean, by lumping them in, then you're isolating them.
(CROSSTALK) REEVES: By lumping them in, the same as the manosphere thing.
Like, the problem with our general culture is that we all do it both ways. We lump -- we just our lumps are too big. We just say, this is what MAGA looks like or this is what woke looks like, right And you take the most extreme woke people and say, everyone on the left thinks that, no, they don't.
Or you take the most extreme people on the right who want to deny women the vote and say, well, that's what people on the right are like. No. No, they're not. We have to get better generally, but perhaps especially around these issues of gender, of knowing the difference between the fringe and the mainstream.
BROWN: Why should we all care as a society about how men and boys are doing?
REEVES: One of the great insights of the women's movement has been that, when women aren't reaching their full potential in all aspects of life, that's bad for society. It's bad for the economy. It's bad for families. It's bad if women aren't flourishing, bad for men if women aren't flourishing.
[10:45:00]
Same is true the other way around. If men aren't flourishing, if we're not allowing our boys and our men to reach their full potential, to flourish, to contribute to society in all the ways that they can, that's bad, of course, for them, but it's bad for everybody. It's bad for women who end up having to do maybe more of the work. It's bad for society if we pay the cultural costs of social dislocation.
It's bad if we're just leaving talent on the table that we should otherwise be using. And so, the central insight of the women's movement at its best has been, we will all do better if women are able to flourish.
And I would just add now, in case we need to remind ourselves, we will also all do better if not only young women, but also young men are able to flourish, because in the end, a world of floundering men is not going to do well to flourishing women or vice versa.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: It's the birthplace of the chicken wing and home to my big beautiful Bills. I'll show you why my hometown of Buffalo, New York is my happy place. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:50:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STAFF SGT. JOSEPH LUPPINO: Hi, I'm Staff Sergeant Luppino. This is MWD Rick. We're currently deployed in the Middle East. Just want to give a huge shout out to my beautiful wife, Jatel (ph). My mom, Jamie. My dad, Marty. And my brother, Anthony, who is also serving overseas right now. I want to say happy holiday and love you guys. Go Giants.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: From stunning video that showed a mid-air collision over the Potomac River to a public and very bitter feud like no other witnessed inside the People's House.
BLITZER: CNN viewers created this year's list of the top 10 viral videos of 2025. Here's CNN's Boris Sanchez.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR (voice over): Number ten, Trump targets Iran. Hours after the United States began its precision airstrikes on three nuclear facilities, in an unprecedented aerial bombardment of Iran, the president spoke to the nation.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Tonight, I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success.
SANCHEZ (voice over): In the aftermath, some members of Congress openly questioned the constitutionality of the strikes, while others, especially MAGA lawmakers, supported the administration.
Number nine, L.A. devastated. Satellite images showing the breadth and depth of the runaway Eaton Wildfire. The fast-moving flames this past January forcing thousands to flee their homes in search of higher and safer ground. Devastation like this will take years to rebuild.
Number eight, a shocking midair collision caught on tape. On January 29th of this year, an American Airlines flight, operated by American Eagle, and a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter collided over the freezing Potomac River at night. The tragedy caught on tape. The jet was on final approach to Reagan National, while the helicopter had been performing a required flying evaluation. All 67 people aboard both aircrafts died.
Number seven, an American is pope. In May, shortly after the death of Pope Francis, the College of Cardinals elected their next leader. And to the surprise of many, the choice was this man, Chicago's very own cardinal, Robert Francis Prevost, the first Augustinian pope.
POPE LEO: I invite you to recognize the marvels that the Lord has done.
SANCHEZ (voice over): Even more surprising, he briefly spoke in English during his first mass.
Number six, hot mic. Justin Trudeau, who at the time was Canada's prime minister, overheard making a jaw-dropping admission to business leaders back in February, essentially telling them that President Trump's talk of making Canada a 51st U.S. state was no joke. So, far, Canada remains Canada. Number five. Cramer speaks out. Famed CNBC broadcaster Jim Cramer appearing on Erin Burnett's show earlier this year, admitting he was misled by the Trump administration's tariffs policy. Listen.
JIM CARMER, FORMER CNBC BROADCASTER: Over and over again the president said, listen, it's going to be reciprocal. So, you do it. We do it. And that was going to be so great. And I really believed in it. And I feel like a sucker tonight.
SANCHEZ (voice over): Number four, swallowed whole. A father on a kayak captures the moment his son, Adrian, was briefly swallowed by a humpback whale off the coast of Chile. Adrian told CNN he didn't realize at first it was a whale and thought he just got caught up in a big wave.
ADRIAN: If the whale had hit me, it would be more dangerous.
SANCHEZ (voice over): What a story to tell his grandkids.
Number three, beauty influencer gunned down. Valeria Marquez was shot and killed by a man who entered her salon, all while on a TikTok livestream in Zapopan, Mexico. Her death sending shockwaves through a country grappling with frequent suspected cases of femicide.
Number two, Jimmy Kimmel. Speaking out after a brief suspension following controversial comments he made about conservative activist Charlie Kirk, Jimmy Kimmel returned to ABC late night to say he never intended to make light of Kirk's murder. Also delivering powerful remarks about freedom of speech.
[10:55:00]
JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST, "JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE": This show is not important. What is important is that we get to live in a country that allows us to have a show like this.
SANCHEZ (voice over): And the number one viral video on CNN's countdown, the feud seen round the world.
VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT: Get out so --
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Wait a minute. No, no, you've done a lot of talking.
SANCHEZ (voice over): On the left, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, hoping to win more lethal aid from the president. On the right, President Trump, moments before he would launch into a verbal rampage against Zelenskyy.
Boris Sanchez, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning and thank you so much for joining us for this special edition of the Situation Room. I'm Kate Bolduan in for Wolf and --
[11:00:00]
