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The Source with Kaitlan Collins
Trump On Roberts' Rebuke: "He Didn't Mention My Name"; Trump: Did Not Discuss Ending Aid To Ukraine With Putin; NASA Astronauts Return To Earth After Nine-Month Delay. Aired 9-10p ET
Aired March 18, 2025 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[21:00:00]
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): And it will take time to adjust.
In fact, when Kelly landed back on Earth, in 2016, he was actually two inches taller. But then, as gravity took hold, his height, along with most of the other physical changes, did eventually go back to baseline. Took about six months, with the study concluding that human health can be mostly sustained for a year in space.
Kelly did, however, find some benefits.
SCOTT KELLY, FORMER COMMANDER, INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION: When I got back, on my previous flight, I was getting a massage at one of these, like, Massage Envy places. And the lady goes, she goes, You have the softest feet I've ever felt in my life. And she did not know I was in space. And I was like, Thank you, I'm very proud of them.
GUPTA (voice-over): Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, reporting.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, ANDERSON COOPER 360: That's it for us. The news continues. "THE SOURCE WITH KAITLAN COLLINS" starts now.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, CNN HOST, THE SOURCE WITH KAITLAN COLLINS: Straight from THE SOURCE tonight.
President Trump's first response to that rare rebuke by Chief Justice John Roberts, after Trump calls for a judge to be impeached because he didn't like his ruling.
Senator Bernie Sanders will join me live.
Also, a tale of two very different readouts. While Trump is projecting confidence, following that call with Vladimir Putin today, the Kremlin has stopped far short of agreeing to the full ceasefire that Ukraine did. The Russians then launched a massive bombing campaign after that call. So what happens now?
And also, making a splash, so spectacular, it almost didn't even look real. Two astronauts who were in a space jam, for over nine months, finally back home, on Earth, tonight.
I'm Kaitlan Collins. And this is THE SOURCE.
Good evening from Washington, where at the White House tonight, President Trump is defending his call, for a federal judge to be impeached, not because of alleged corruption or malfeasance, but because he didn't like the judge's ruling, which I should note, was a temporary decision by the judge, that he's still in the middle of considering.
This, and this multi-front and multi-faceted pressure campaign from Trump's allies, got the attention of the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, with John Roberts issuing a rare public rebuke.
But tonight, Trump is really shrugging off, as he's still digging in on that call for that same judge's impeachment.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Well, he didn't mention my name in the statement. I just saw it quickly. He didn't mention my name.
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS HOST: Yes.
TRUMP: But many people have called for his impeachment. The impeachment of this judge.
I don't know who the judge is. But he's radical left. He was Obama- appointed. And he actually said, we shouldn't be able to take criminals, killers, murderers, horrible, the worst people, gang members, gang leaders, that we shouldn't be allowed to take them out of our country.
Well, that's a presidential job. That's not for a local judge to be making that determination. And I thought it was terrible.
INGRAHAM: Are there circumstances where you would defy a court order?
TRUMP: Well, I think that, number one, nobody's been through more courts than I have. I think nobody knows the courts any better than I have. I would say the Chief Judge does. But nobody knows them better than I have.
And what -- what they've done to me, I've had the worst judges.
INGRAHAM: But going forward, would you--
TRUMP: I had judges that were so corrupt.
INGRAHAM: --would you defy a court order? Because that--
TRUMP: No, I never--
INGRAHAM: We all know that. And that was out (ph).
TRUMP: I never did defy a court order.
INGRAHAM: And you wouldn't in the future?
TRUMP: No, you can't do that. However, we have bad judges. We have very bad judges, and these are judges that shouldn't be allowed. I think they -- I think, at a certain point, you have to start looking at what do you do, when you have a rogue judge. The judge that we're talking about, he's -- you look at his other rulings. I mean, rulings unrelated. But having to do with me? He's a lunatic.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: Now, as Trump noted at the beginning there, Chief Justice John Roberts did not directly name the President. But he really didn't have to.
It was about 12 hours ago that Trump posted this, calling the U.S. District Court judge that we're talking about here, James Boasberg, a lunatic, troublemaker and an agitator, then calling for him to be removed from the federal bench.
This is the judge that we talked about last night. He's at the center of a major debate that is playing out, here in Washington, over presidential power, and Trump's use of this wartime statute, to deport alleged Venezuelan gang members.
Roughly three hours after that post there, from Trump, calling for Judge Boasberg to be impeached, the Chief Justice John Roberts responded, saying in a rare statement, quote, "For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision. The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose."
Now, if you consider that statement, and what Trump said tonight. Remember this. It was two weeks ago that President Trump, as he was walking out of the House chamber, following his address to Congress, that he shook the hand of Chief Justice John Roberts, gave a pat on the back, and added this comment.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Thank you again.
Thank you again.
Won't forget it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: Now, Trump later said, he was thanking Roberts, for swearing him in, at his inauguration, a few weeks ago.
[21:05:00]
And tonight, as Trump is repeating his calls to impeach Boasberg, he didn't explain how that squares with the comments that we heard from him, last Friday, when he was speaking at the Justice Department, and complained about people who have criticized judges.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We had an amazing judge in Florida, and her name is Aileen Cannon.
I just hope you can all watch for it, but it's totally illegal. And it was so unfair what they were doing to her. But they do it all the time with judges. But in her case, she was very courageous, and it only made her angry.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: My lead source tonight is the Independent senator from Vermont, Bernie Sanders.
And Senator, it's great to have you here. Because you issued your own rebuke, as I'll call it, and basically said that you think President Trump needs to turn off Fox News and, quote, Read the Constitution.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT): Look, the guys who wrote the Constitution, back in the 1790s, were nobody's fools. What they wanted to do is have a separation of powers between the executive, the legislative, and the judiciary, so that one person could not assume enormous power.
And what you are seeing, right now, is a president, who is authoritarian. He just attacked the media, the other day. I think he called CNN, illegal, because, I gather that, now and then you criticize him. He is trying to encroach on the constitutional responsibilities and spending powers of Congress. And now he's going after the courts.
Look, if somebody is a corrupt judge, that person can and should be impeached. But not because you voice an opinion. That's why these guys have life terms, so they are immune from these types of attack, and they can be objective in their judgment.
And just the word here, in the last number of years, and I'm not a great fan of Chief Justice Roberts, you have had decisions from the Supreme Court on Citizens United, which allow billionaires to buy elections, one of the worst decisions in the history of the Supreme Court. You didn't see a whole lot of people saying, Impeach Roberts and members of the court. You had this horrible decision on Roe versus Wade, taking away women's rights to control their own bodies.
Again, we live in a society of rule of law. Supreme Court has its power. Judges have their power. And it should frighten every American, whether you're conservative or progressive, that you have a president, who does not respect our Constitution, and wants more and more power for himself.
COLLINS: What does--
SANDERS: Very dangerous.
COLLINS: What does it say that, that the Chief Justice who -- that's a great point. You have also criticized decisions that the Supreme Court has made with John Roberts as the Chief Justice. But what does it say that he felt the need to come out and issue this rebuke of Trump tonight?
SANDERS: Well, I don't know Roberts all that well. I'm not a great fan of his court. But I think he does understand, I suspect, the danger of a president who does not respect the Constitution of the United States, and wants more and more power for himself.
COLLINS: It would take 67 senators to remove a judge from the federal bench. That would mean that every Republican would have to vote for it, and I believe 14--
SANDERS: Ain't going to happen. No, we don't have to--
(CROSSTALK)
COLLINS: --14 Democrats--
SANDERS: It's not going to happen. OK. Period. We don't have to--
COLLINS: OK. I just--
SANDERS: But what we have to worry about is this movement toward authoritarianism.
Trump admires and loves people, he thinks they're great, they're beautiful people, when they agree with him. But if you criticize him, You're acting illegally, You should be impeached, You're terrible, et cetera, You're a left wing fanatic, whatever he calls people. A very dangerous tread.
Look, I don't have to tell anybody that we are living in difficult times. And it's not only this movement toward authoritarianism.
It's this movement toward oligarchy, where you have a number of billionaires running the United States government, where you're seeing right now, with Musk and others, massive attacks against veterans, and the Veterans Administration. They want to lay off some 80,000 people in the V.A., who provide health care to our veterans, who make sure they get the benefits that they deserve.
You're now seeing a massive attack on Social Security. Presumably, they want people with disabilities to now walk in to some Social Security office, although they're cutting back on these Social Security offices all over this country.
And at the end of the day, Kaitlan, in my view, you got a bunch of these oligarchs, who want to destroy virtually every program in America that works for working-class people, so that you have massive tax breaks to the 1 percent and the billionaire class.
COLLINS: Yes.
SANDERS: And as you may know, I'll be on the road with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the next few days, trying to fight back against this horrific set of activities.
[21:10:00]
COLLINS: Yes, you've been on this anti-oligarchy tour. You've been making stops. I mean, it's really notable to see the crowds, and how many people are showing up.
We're showing one of the pictures of you speaking, here.
(GRAPHIC IS SHOWN OF SEN. BERNIE SANDERS' "FIGHTING OLIGARCHY" TOUR)
COLLINS: And you've been going to all over, I know, to Colorado, to Wisconsin, all over the country. I know you have a lot more stops planned, next week.
What you just said about Elon Musk, and what Trump are -- Trump are doing now that he's back in power.
It's safe to say there's a lot of despair, in the country, over what Democrats are doing, how they're responding to this. You're an Independent, but you caucus with the Democrats.
I want you to listen to what happened at a town hall, tonight, with Democratic congressman, Glenn Ivey.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You aren't even working together on a shared strategy.
(APPLAUSE)
(CHEERING)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And that is failure.
We are not interested in hearing that you are in the minority. We know that. We want you to show some of the backbone and strategic brilliance that Mitch McConnell would have in the minority.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: Is that what you have been hearing out on the road, Senator?
SANDERS: I think there is a lot of discontent with the Democratic leadership, and I think, with the entire Democratic Party.
And one of the things that I and Alexandria will be trying to do is get people involved in the political process, either as Independents or as progressive Democrats, to stand up for our working-class in this country, which is being hammered every single day.
Real inflation accounted for wages have not gone up in 52 years, while the very richest people have become much richer. Our health care system is broken. Our housing system is broken. Our child care system is broken. We're not making the progress we need, to address the climate crisis that we face.
And yet, the majority of the American people believe that we should have a government that works for them and not the few, which is what we have right now. So, I hope we can rally the American people, in so many ways, to understand the critical moment that we're in, and to get them to stand up and fight back, not only against Trump.
But in the richest country in the history of the world, we should not be the only country, major country, that doesn't guarantee health care to all people, or paid family and medical leave, or have 80 -- 800,000 people sleeping out on the street. We're the richest country in the history of the world. We can have a government and an economy that works well for all.
COLLINS: When it comes to that effort in the Senate, do you think Senator Chuck Schumer is the right person to lead it?
SANDERS: It's not -- I know, everyone's beating up on Chuck, and I strongly disagree with them. Strongly. No one is in the caucus more critical of Schumer than I am. But it's not Schumer. It's the caucus. It's not the caucus. It's the Democratic Party.
You got to take a deep breath and understand that you have a Democratic Party -- you know, you got a Republican Party which is owned by Musk. Any Republican who defies Donald Trump will be primaried by Musk's unlimited amounts of money.
In the Democratic Party, you've got a party that is heavily dominated by the billionaire class, run by consultants who are way out of touch with reality. It has -- the Democratic Party has virtually no grassroots support.
So, what we are trying to do is, in one way or another, maybe create a party within the party, of bringing millions of young people, working- class people, people of color, to demand that the Democratic Party start standing with the working-class of this country, and take on the very powerful corporate interests that have never had it so good.
COLLINS: You have been out on the road, hearing that from voters, with Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, as you mentioned. People are saying she should primary Schumer. Do you think she'd be a formidable opponent if she did?
SANDERS: I don't want to get -- look, the issue right now is not worrying about a primary three years ago -- three years from now, whenever it is going to be. That's media stuff, Kaitlan. That's not what people are worried about. What we have got to do now is wake up--
COLLINS: It's Democratic voters' stuff too though.
SANDERS: What we have got to do now is wake up the American people. The vast majority of the American people do not believe that we should give tax breaks to billionaires and cut Medicaid, cut Social Security, cut veterans' programs and nutrition. And our job is to rally the people, at the grassroots level, have them run for school board, or Congress, or the Senate, on an agenda that says that, we're going to stand up for working-class people, not the rich. That's the --that's what we've got to do in this moment.
COLLINS: Yes. And certainly, I mean, we have seen this at your town halls. And for people who haven't been watching, where you've been going, I mean, it's -- your stops, across the country, it's been quite fascinating to see just the audience reaction.
Senator, I do want to ask you. Because tonight, we have breaking news that President Trump has fired the two Democratic members of the Federal Trade Commission. Usually, the President's party has three seats, the opposing has two, on that board.
SANDERS: Yes.
COLLINS: Do you believe that move is illegal?
SANDERS: Yes. I mean, he tried to get rid of the National Labor Relations Board people as well.
[21:15:00]
Look, this is the guy, as I just mentioned a moment ago, he happens not to believe in the rule of law, not to believe in the Constitution, and he will try to exercise his power in any and every way. And the American people have got to stand up and stop him.
COLLINS: Senator Bernie Sanders, always appreciate your time, and thanks for taking time out of the tour to join us here on CNN.
SANDERS: Thank you very much.
COLLINS: Up next. We're getting all kinds of details out of the White House, and from the Kremlin, on that highly-anticipated and closely- watched call today, between President Trump and President Putin, on a ceasefire in Ukraine. What happens next, as Russia is now attacking Ukraine, following that call. We have details, ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[21:20:00]
COLLINS: Russian forces unleashed a new attack across cities in Ukraine, in the dead of the night, after that nearly two-hour phone call that happened earlier, between Presidents Trump and Putin, a call that ended without Russia agreeing to a 30-day pause on all fighting, something that Ukraine had agreed to.
The Russian leader did agree to lay off hitting targets, like Ukraine's energy grid or its power plants. But of course, important to note with that, that that spares Putin's energy infrastructure as well.
And when you look closely at the two readouts that we got today, one from the White House, and one from the Kremlin, of the call, the differences are obvious.
For example, the Kremlin says that it pointed out that a complete cessation of providing Kyiv with foreign military aid and intelligence must become the key condition for preventing an escalation of the conflict and making progress towards its resolution. A.k.a. no more military aid or intel sharing to Ukraine.
But the White House didn't mention that demand, to stop military aid, from the call. And Trump said tonight, they didn't talk about it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: No, he didn't -- we didn't talk about aid. Actually, we didn't talk about aid at all. We talked about a lot of things, but aid was never discussed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: My sources on all of this are:
The former Deputy Director of National Intelligence, Beth Sanner.
And the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander, Admiral James Stavridis, who has a new book, called "The Admiral's Bookshelf."
And it's great to have you both here.
Beth, when you look at this, and the two different readouts here, in terms of what this looks like, what does it say to you that one mentions stopping military aid, Trump says they didn't talk about it. And just in general, what were your takeaways from the two-hour call?
BETH SANNER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST, FORMER DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: I mean, look, we are looking at the very top of the iceberg, right, in terms of these readouts. We're only getting maybe, I don't know, 0.01 percent of what this two-hour call was, half for translation, but nonetheless. Like, we don't actually know what happened, do we? So, I don't know if that's true or not, that they didn't talk about that.
I think that there was probably quite a bit that was discussed. But I think that the main thing, I take away from this, is that there is one person, who's driving the terms of this negotiation. It is not Donald Trump. It is President Putin.
Because if we were, taking us back a week ago, where we left Marco Rubio, saying, We're going to present Russia with an unconditional ceasefire, and we'll see which one of these countries is a problem for peace?
Well, we just found out. But instead, he got praised. So these are all Putin's terms.
COLLINS: Admiral Stavridis, how do you see this in terms of, you know, Trump said tonight, the next step is a full ceasefire. But do you -- do you believe the Kremlin appears to be any closer to that, from that 0.01 percent of the readout that we got, as Beth put it?
ADM. JAMES STAVRIDIS (RET.), FORMER NATO SUPREME ALLIED COMMANDER, AUTHOR, "THE RESTLESS WAVE": Yes, I think Beth's background at the CIA is showing, and I think she's right, which is to say Putin is kind of playing rope-a-dope here.
He's going to try and do everything he can to appease Donald Trump. But at the same time, he really does not want to give up what he perceives, I think correctly at the moment, is a military advantage.
So, what is he going to do? He'll agree to what is, frankly, a kind of a minor ceasefire, sliver of, OK, I won't go after infrastructure, I won't go after electric grid.
We'll see. He's launching missiles right now.
On the other hand, the big ceasefire, that's still a chimera glimmering off in the distance, Putin is just playing the table right now.
COLLINS: And Admiral, what does it mean for the fighting on the ground, actually, with what Russia did agree to in terms of -- I mean, Ukraine had actually been making progress on that front, on hitting Russia's. What does this mean for what happens on the ground right now?
STAVRIDIS: Well, let's start with that terrible five days, where the U.S. ceased supplying weapons, but I think, more importantly, Beth will agree with this, with supplying intelligence. That's like taking a boxer in the ring and dropping a full-court mask across his or her face. You can't fight if you can't see.
So, I think as long as we keep the intelligence flowing, we can keep the Ukrainians in the game right here, both on the ground and in the air. The key is going to be whether or not Putin ultimately decides he wants to get to a ceasefire. So far, I'm not seeing anything that makes me confident of that.
COLLINS: Well, Beth, on this front. I mean, when you look at this, and knowing, as someone who studies Putin, and what he does, and his tactics, do you think he's just trying to stall for time here?
[21:25:00]
SANNER: There's stalling, but there's also positioning. One of the things that I really took away from the Kremlin readout was how much this is framed as two great men, who are running Great Powers, and our role is to have this global responsibility.
And so, all of this is about rehabilitating Putin, bringing him back into the international community, and being seen at home as being very, very strong. And I think that he is actually succeeding in these ways.
COLLINS: Well, is that part of him -- when -- at the end of the readout, they talked about hockey, and having the United States and Russia play hockey again, and rearranging those games. I mean, is that part of that? Is that kind of a sportswashing, of what we've seen happen with Russia?
SANNER: I just keep wondering who is Ovechkin going to play for? But, yes, sure, it's--
COLLINS: It's bit tough, but.
SANNER: It's a sportswashing. It's an everything-washing. It is -- and we're helping, because we are equivocating, in our statement, Russia and Ukraine, this war should never have started. There is literally zero penalty for Putin saying, No.
COLLINS: Yes, and Admiral Stavridis, when it comes to Zelenskyy, and the Europeans here, and what this looks like? I mean, Zelenskyy, we haven't seen the Ukrainians say, Yes, we'll agree to this, this halt on attacks on energy and infrastructure. What does that look like?
STAVRIDIS: Well, first and foremost, we got to recognize our greatest comparative advantage here, over Russia, is the fact that we have allies. We have allies, partners, and friends, around the world, including NATO. And by the way, if we want to play hockey with the Russians, we better keep the Canadians on our side, not drive them away.
So, here's the point. What the Europeans need to do is to step in, lean in, make the administration understand that they ought to have a seat at this table. They are contributing more money, more capability, more capacity to the Ukrainians than the United States is.
So, Beth is right. The Russians and, so far, the U.S., are trying to position this as two great men, conducting great-power politics. Europe is a very powerful factor. We ought to be trying to pull them into this conversation. It can only lend weight to our side of the equation.
COLLINS: We'll see what that looks like.
Admiral Stavridis. And Beth Sanner. Great to have you both and your expertise here.
Also tonight, we are tracking something that happened shortly before coming on air. It was an out-of-this-world return to Earth, for these two NASA astronauts, after that dramatic nine-month saga in space, with a pod of dolphins even showing up to greet them.
[21:30:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: Tonight, a homecoming that was nine months in the making.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And splashdown. Crew-9 back on Earth.
(CHEERING)
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: That applause, the moment that NASA astronauts, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, splashed down off the coast of Florida today, ending a space mission that was supposed to last eight days, but after some technical difficulties, ended up taking 286.
You see Williams and Wilmore, all smiles, as they were pulled from the SpaceX Dragon's spaceship -- spacecraft, on that recovery ship. And after some extensive medical checks, they are going to be flown to the Johnson Space Center in Houston. That's where they'll get to reunite with their families, after such a long time.
My inside source tonight has been to space not once, twice, but three times. Retired astronaut, Chris Hadfield, spent nearly six months up there, commanding the International Space Station, and is also the Author of the new book, "Final Orbit," a timely read.
And it's so great to have you here tonight.
I wonder how you felt, seeing that moment, with the crew safely landing back on Earth.
CHRIS HADFIELD, RETIRED COLONEL ASTRONAUT: Kaitlan, I'm overjoyed. I know Suni and Butch well. I've spent many years training and working together. In fact, I was Suni's backup for one of her earlier space flights.
And it's been a long, tough go for them, of course. They have thrived and done great. But there's nothing like coming home, and coming home safely. And I agree with you, seeing the smiles on their face, it really warms my heart.
COLLINS: And talking about what this return actually does to you. We have pictures of your return. This is 2013. You've talked about this extensively, at times, and described it as a physically-harrowing process. What does it like -- what are they feeling tonight? What is it like to feel gravity after being weightless for as long as they were?
HADFIELD: Kaitlan, it's like gravity is so unfair, after having been weightless for six months, and now suddenly there's this invisible monster literally trying to crush you into the ground, like a great big heel trying to grind you into the dirt.
And you've been magically floating weightless, in their case, for nine months. And now suddenly, your arms -- have to lift your arms up, but inside your body as well, your heart, for the first time in nine months, has to lift the blood all the way from the tips of your toes to the top of your head.
[21:35:00] They've got a bunch of readaptation to get their bodies back used to gravity where they grew up. And it's painful. They haven't stood for nine months. And so, the muscles in their legs and their rear end will hurt.
And the bottoms of their feet, they've lost the calluses that were there, where they walked every day. And now for nine months. So the bottoms of their feet are like a little baby's feet, and so the bottoms of their feet will hurt. They'll have to go through all of that, as well, as the longer-term medical rehabilitation.
But the, I think, the smiles on their face show just how proud they are to be back, how they think what they did was worthwhile, and the joy when they get to see their families in-person.
COLLINS: Yes, I mean, that's such a good point, though, just in terms of, if you don't walk on the ground for this long, what that does to you, if you're not lifting your arm to pick something up, or taking a flight of stairs. I mean, how long does it take you -- how long did it take you to recover?
HADFIELD: Well, I think you saw both of them, with help, stand. If you open your eyes and you focus, you can stand. If as soon as you close your eyes, you'll fall over. But after a few days, you could walk. Maybe if a police officer pulled you over, they'd think you weren't ready to drive, because you're still pretty wobbly.
But after a week or so, you could walk normally again. It takes a while to run because that takes a lot of coordination at once. They'll let you drive a car after a couple weeks. They won't let you fly an airplane for a month or so. I found running took about four months, before running felt natural, again, to me.
And the thing that takes the longest is their bone density. They will have both lost bone density, especially in their hips and their legs, upper legs. And that'll take, on average, maybe three to one, so nine months in space means 27 months on Earth, before their bones get back to the density before launch.
So, they've got a long rehab period coming up. But they'll feel mostly normal here, in a few weeks.
COLLINS: On the bone density thing. I heard this -- we were talking about, you know, Mark Kelly, and his twin brother and -- Scott, what they were dealing with this, when they returned. What does that -- is that a noticeable difference? Can you feel that once you have been able to kind of regain your senses back on Earth?
HADFIELD: You can't feel it. However, we have had two astronauts just sort of trip and fall and break their hips, within a short period of returning, just because your bones, when they get more porous with osteoporosis, they're more fragile, they're more brittle.
And so, we're really careful with people like Suni and Butch, when they first get back, and of course, Nick and Sasha that were on the spaceship with them, the four of them, their bodies are a little more vulnerable, right now, and you have to exercise, walk, run, do all the things that tells your body it needs a denser skeleton.
But the beauty of it is, this osteoporosis was caused by being weightless, so being back on Earth and just getting the regular, heavy daily exercise, it'll get their bones dense again. And so, they won't have to worry about their bones being brittle. It'll just take a little while.
COLLINS: Yes, and of course, I'm sure their families are just ecstatic that they are --that they are back here.
Chris, it's great to have you and your experience, and to hear what it's like. Thank you for sharing that with us tonight.
HADFIELD: Thanks.
And welcome back to Earth, Butch and Suni.
COLLINS: Absolutely. So happy to celebrate that. Thank you so much.
Also, tonight, here in Washington, we have new comments from the President, on that latest attack on a Tesla facility, which the FBI is now investigating. Does it count as domestic terrorism? We'll tell you what Trump had to say.
[21:40:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: New comments from President Trump, tonight, on that attack on a Tesla facility, this morning, that the FBI is now investigating as a potential act of domestic terrorism.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: So, Elon is a patriot. And again, I hardly knew Elon until the, you know, election. And he turned out that he liked me better than he liked these radical lunatics that were -- better than Kamala, better than Joe, you know, because he's an intelligent person. He liked, and he backed, me, and he went and he got very much involved. He thought -- he actually would go around saying, If Trump doesn't win, our country is over.
INGRAHAM: But do you consider this an act of domestic terrorism?
TRUMP: Sure. Sure. I think. I think so.
INGRAHAM: Why?
TRUMP: I think that if and when they catch the people, and I hope they do, the good thing is they have a lot of cameras in those places. And they've caught some already, having to do with that. I think that you will find out that they're paid by people that are very highly political on the left.
(END VIDEO CLIP) COLLINS: Right now, there's no evidence that anyone was paid to attack Teslas in Las Vegas. What we do know is police are investigating, after a person who was dressed in black was seen shooting at several cars, and igniting two of them in flames using Molotov cocktails.
This is just the latest incident that we are seeing, in a wave of attacks on Tesla's showrooms, charging stations, and just the vehicles themselves, amid a lot of anger over Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, and his DOGE team's government cuts.
Joining me tonight are my White House insiders.
Alex Thompson is a National Political Correspondent for Axios.
And Sabrina Rodriguez is a National Politics Reporter at The Washington Post.
And we just heard from Elon Musk on this tonight. He was doing an interview from the North Lawn of the White House. And this is what he had to say.
[21:45:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ELON MUSK, SENIOR ADVISOR TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Tesla is a peaceful company. We've never done anything harmful. I've never done anything harmful. I've only done productive things.
So, I think we just have a deranged -- it's -- there's some kind of mental illness thing going on here, because this doesn't make any sense
SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS HOST: Yes. Well you--
MUSK: And I think there are larger forces at work as well. I mean, I don't know, who's funding it and who's coordinating it? Because this is -- this is crazy. I've never seen anything like this.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: What do you make of what we're hearing out of the White House, and also the Justice Department, on this tonight?
ALEX THOMPSON, NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, AXIOS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I mean, there's a big difference between vandalism and terrorism. And the fact that even Trump opened the door as terrorism, you can use a lot of those 9/11 laws, and even like the laws from Oklahoma City bombing in the 90s, you could use those to create federal offenses. So, there's a huge difference between the two.
COLLINS: Yes, and we're hearing from Pam Bondi, tonight. She was calling it nothing short of domestic terrorism as they're investigating this, and she said that they would also -- they're all implying, essentially, that someone's orchestrating this or behind it. She said, We'll continue these investigations, including on those operating behind-the-scenes to coordinate and fund these crimes.
SABRINA RODRIGUEZ, NATIONAL POLITICS REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: I think in some ways it's not totally surprising the reaction that we're seeing from the Trump administration. Because, as you mentioned, I mean, this is unsubstantiated. There is no evidence that this is something that's being orchestrated or organized by the left.
But really, what we have seen is a lot of the protests, which, in many places, have been sort of peaceful, and just people expressing their anger outside, stems from the frustration that people have with this administration, stems from the anger that a lot of people have towards specifically Elon Musk, and what he's trying to do to cut government spending, and really just slash the federal government overall, right now.
THOMPSON: As to--
COLLINS: And there's obviously a huge line in between being upset over the cuts, and what's happening, or how quickly it's happening, or how it's happening, and committing an illegal act, like these people are--
THOMPSON: Yes.
COLLINS: --by attacking the showrooms, the charging stations, people's vehicles.
THOMPSON: I also think it's part of larger phenomenon of people, consumers, basically taking out their feelings on companies, with politics they disagree with. You've seen this build up over years and years and years. Now, that's not always vandalism and violence and throwing fires. But there have been instances of this that just keep crescendoing.
As the politics of the country become more polarized, people sort of take it on individual companies, based on their politics, which is why some companies are trying to backtrack from politics, and political stances they took in the last decade.
COLLINS: Yes, and Elon Musk obviously has put himself squarely in the middle of that. He's speaking from the North Lawn of the White House tonight. He is a top advisor to Trump.
And speaking of what he is doing with the government. We had a judge rule tonight that a lot of what they have done with USAID, and dismantling it, as the judge argued, was likely unconstitutional, that he exceeded his authority, and the judge has now indefinitely blocked the dismantling of this, and in some parts, calling for it to be restored.
But it does kind of feel in that sense that the horse is out of the barn. I mean, they've already closed it. They've already removed the name from it. A lot of it has largely shut down, in anything but name only.
RODRIGUEZ: Well, I think there's a lot of questions, right now, about how exactly you do undo this. We heard as well with one of the injunctions, where they said that the administration needed to hire back probationary workers. Well, they're now forced to hire back probationary workers, but are putting them on administrative leave.
I mean, there's sort of all these questions of, once you've started this, how exactly do you stop this? How exactly does a judge keep track of what is being done to undo it?
And again, I think this is just fueling some of the frustration that we're seeing across the country, of people trying to make sense of what exactly is happening, in Washington, especially when you see several actions happening in one day. I mean, even it's a lot for us to keep up with. Imagine for people at home.
COLLINS: Yes.
THOMPSON: Well, this is part of Trump's strategy, was actually to make it, so even if there were injunctions, even if there were blocks, that basically it would be too far gone, that it would never be fully reconstituted in its original form.
COLLINS: Yes.
Alex Thompson. Sabrina Rodriguez. Great to have you both here on set tonight.
We also have some breaking news this hour, as the administration has just released what they say are thousands of the JFK assassination files. But the question is, do they really reveal anything that we didn't already know?
[21:50:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: Tonight, the Trump administration has released thousands of records related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy with the White House, saying that these documents have previously been classified, and now they are on the National Archives website, where anyone can look at them.
But I do want to be clear. As our CNN team is continuing to pore through these documents and look at them. So far, in the few hours since they've been released, there doesn't seem to be anything in tonight's release, at least, that would change what historians and intelligence officials have known since Kennedy's assassination in 1963. That he was killed by the lone gunman, Lee Harvey Oswald, who shot President Kennedy with a rifle, from the sixth floor of a Dallas building.
My sources on the breaking news tonight are:
Tom Samoluk, the former Deputy Director of the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Review Board.
And also, the former FBI Deputy Director, Andrew McCabe.
And it's great to have both of you with their expertise here.
Because Tom, just so people know, in the 1990s, you got to see a lot of these documents, as part of a panel, to see what could be released. Has anything, in tonight's drop, so far, changed what was already known about his assassination?
TOM SAMOLUK, FORMER DEPUTY DIRECTOR, JFK ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARD: No, I don't think so, Kaitlan.
[21:55:00]
The Review Board, in the mid-90s, released 99 percent of the records that we reviewed. We only held back records where, under the law, the intelligence community could make a case that names or sources and methods had to be held back. So, the Review Board and the staff saw this body of records.
The question is, is there anything beyond that that could be of interest? Recently, the FBI said in February that there were 2,400 documents that they had not found before. So the question is, what's in there? Those records would not have been seen by the Review Board.
COLLINS: Former FBI Deputy Director, Andrew McCabe, I mean, what do you -- what's your view of what you've seen so far tonight?
ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST, FORMER DEPUTY DIRECTOR, FBI: Yes, really not much there so far.
There's a couple of things that are kind of hampering people's ability to understand it. It was released pretty quickly, and without the typical kind of organizational structure around the release. So there aren't file numbers and agency identification in the file. So literally, we have to go through every single file, page by page, to determine what's there.
A lot of these documents are thought to have been released in prior releases. It's just that they may have additional redactions removed, so we might get a few details here and there. But there are no bombshells suspected, at the moment.
COLLINS: Yes, and obviously it takes so much work to go through these documents, to look through them, to see what they're going to look like.
And Tom, I think this has become this point of fascination. But what it reminds me of is just a few weeks ago, we had the Epstein Files that were being released by the White House. They were saying, In the name of transparency. But it ignited a huge war within the MAGA-right, because there wasn't new information there, anything that hadn't come out in the many criminal trials or the civil lawsuits filed against people in that situation.
And so, when you look at this, there have been a lot of conspiracies about more than one person being behind the attack, or the CIA being involved. But does releasing this actually put any of that to rest? Or do you think those people, can they be satisfied, I guess?
SAMOLUK: Well, I don't think it will put any questions to rest, Kaitlan. I do think it is important for the government to be able to say once and for all, more than 61 years after the assassination that, We hold no more records from the American public.
And then the American public is free to decide, those who are interested, to look at these records. And it's a very robust, rich history that the Review Board focused on having around the assassination. The height of the Cold War, it was a very complicated time. And that record should be complete for the American people.
COLLINS: Yes, I mean, I just, when I think about this. Trump himself spread conspiracies about this. I mean, we had Senator Ted Cruz on for -- we've had him on twice now. But his first interview, we talked about this, because this was a huge saga in the 2016 campaign, where Trump was involving his father in this.
MCCABE: Right.
COLLINS: Just to take people down memory lane, this was that moment.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: He said, you know, very nasty things about me. And then I just asked about stories that were appearing all over the place, not just in the National Enquirer, about the fact that a picture was taken of him and Lee Harvey Oswald. And they didn't deny that picture. And I just asked, What was that all about?
SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX): Donald Trump alleges that my dad was involved in assassinating JFK. Now, let's be clear. This is nuts. This is not a reasonable position. This is just kooky.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: I mean, what does that say to you, just about all of this?
MCCABE: I think it points out the absurdity of it, right? We know from David Pecker's testimony in Trump's criminal trial in New York. Pecker, of course, the publisher of the National Enquirer. He, under oath, admitted that that story was completely manufactured--
COLLINS: They merged together a photo of two men--
MCCABE: And that's right.
COLLINS: --to try to make it look like.
MCCABE: And they did it for political reasons, to tarnish Senator Cruz's reputation in the midst of that campaign.
So, you have to ask yourself, like, what is the purpose of this? I think there's no question. There's a value to releasing documents, when they're no longer sensitive. There's an investigative value, kind of crowdsourcing the investigation and the understanding of this significant historical event.
But what are the reasons the administration is so focused on this right now? It certainly seems there is a bit of a distraction purpose, kind of embedded into these serial releases of things that people aren't even looking for, like, for instance, the MLK assassination documents, of which there are allegedly 50 or so pages in this tranche.
We're not going to really learn too much more about the MLK assassination, from these random documents. But we'll see. People have an opportunity to take their cut at them, and we will learn from the court of public opinion what they think.
COLLINS: Yes, which is it was still Lee Harvey Oswald.
MCCABE: Yes.
COLLINS: Andrew McCabe, thank you for being here.
Tom Samoluk, great to have you as well, and thank you for your expertise.
Thank you all so much for joining us on this very busy hour.
"CNN NEWSNIGHT WITH ABBY PHILLIP" is up next.
