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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Trump Backtracks, Delays Tariffs On Canada & Mexico; Republicans Warns About Uncertainty Around Trump's Tariffs; W.H. Plans To Cut 70,000 Plus Jobs At Dept. Of Veterans Affairs; Sen. Tim Kaine, (D-VA), Is Interviewed About Job Cuts, VA, DOE; Trump Prepares To Dismantle Education Department. Trump Meets With Cabinet, Musk On Making Cuts "More Precise"; Trump Backtracks, Delays Tariffs On Canada & Mexico; Two Men Charged In Deaths Of Kansas City Chiefs Fans. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired March 06, 2025 - 17:00   ET

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

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mosquito and bingo, dino DNA.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: Apparently great news for Jurassic park fans, we may be just one step closer to walking alongside some of our favorite extinct animals. Scientists have used DNA from the woolly mammoth to create woolly mice? I'm sorry, what? These adorable mice share mammoth like traits with their long, wavy golden fur and the mammals accelerated fat metabolism that allowed them to survive the ice age. It was apparently a big step in colossal biosciences mission to bring back the woolly mammoth this decade as well as the dodo and the Tasmanian tiger.

Unfortunately, were out of time to let Scott Jennings weigh in on this set of mice. Thanks to him and the rest of the panel for joining us. "The Lead" with Jake Tapper starts right now.

[17:00:50]

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: We are once again on the Trump tariff teeter totter. The Lead starts right now.

First it was just auto imports, then it was tariffs on Mexico and now President Trump is saying that all imports under the trade deal with Canada and Mexico are suspended. So what made him flip and what's still on the table? And does anyone understand what's going on or why? The markets are reacting to every single twitch the president makes and that impacts your money.

Then, is a new phase for Trump's cuts in the size of the federal government now being implemented. What the president today revealed about Elon Musk and DOGE and his cabinet seeming to take on a new role in all this.

And a major break in the case of the mysterious horrific deaths of three men who gathered at a home to watch a Kansas City Chiefs game and then somehow ended up dead. New charges in this bizarre, haunting case.

Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper.

And tonight, new signs. Then, what is being called haphazard policymaking by the Trump administration might be hurting the U.S. economy. First, there is the massive impact of the federal government job cuts by the Elon Musk led Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. New jobs data today showing that those DOGE cuts helped fuel a spike in layoffs last month. Recession level spike in layoffs last month, 103 percent increase in layoffs from January, the highest February layoff total since 2009.

And though Elon Musk has so far seemingly had unrestricted power to chainsaw through federal jobs, the president is now calling for, instead of a chainsaw, a scalpel. Just this afternoon, President Trump convened his cabinet for the second time this week. His message to those, you cabinet secretaries, you are in charge of staffing and policy decisions in your departments and agencies, not Elon Musk.

Then of course, there is the economic impacts of Trump's tariffs on top of the fact that he constantly seems to be flip flopping on these tariffs, trading out his own trading policies. U.S. stocks are skiing downhill as President Trump once again moves the goalposts on tariffs, if that's not enough metaphors for you in one sentence. Today announcing a nearly one month tariff delay on almost all products from Mexico and Canada.

Remember, Trump's tariff plans have shifted frequently since he first announced them in November. The implementation date was originally set for early February, then it was pushed to early March. Now here we are in early March, March 6, and the tariffs that were just imposed this week are being paused once again. Of course, that pause does not mean that the trade war is over. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Canada's retaliatory tariffs are going to remain in place until Trump completely rolls back U.S. tariffs.

CNN's Kaitlan Collins is at the White House trying to make sense of all of this for us.

Kaitlan, let's begin with Trump's Cabinet meeting today that seemed to center around DOGE cuts. And I don't want to be too harsh about it, but seeming to sideline to a degree Elon Musk and DOGE. What happened behind the scenes?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: It really was a clarifying of the power dynamics that are at play here, Jake. It wasn't a full cabinet meeting. There were several members, I'm told, who were not present either because they are outed at their agencies or are not in Washington for this meeting. But it was the exact same room that you saw Trump in his cabinet meet last week, where Elon Musk really held forth during that meeting, obviously walking through what he is doing with his government efficiency initiative. But today in this meeting, there were no cameras in the room and instead President Trump was really telling his Cabinet members that instead of having Elon Musk being the final voice on whether or not they are making cuts or who they're cutting at their agencies, the president did remind them and tell them that ultimately it is the agency heads, the Senate confirmed cabinet nominees who are the ones in charge of the staffing decisions at their respective agencies.

[17:05:09]

And the president was asked about this meeting, which I'm told lasted about 90 minutes afterward, when he was signing executive orders in the Oval Office this afternoon, and this is what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I want the Cabinet members to keep good people. I don't want to see a big cut where a lot of good people are cut. I want the cabinet members to keep the good people and the people that aren't doing a good job, that are unreliable, don't show up to work, et cetera. Those people can be cut.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, is that a reflection that you think DOGE and Elon Musk have been moving too quickly?

TRUMP: No, no, I think they've done an amazing job. They've done an amazing job. Elon has been really teaching everybody about the numbers that you can do. But what I want is I want the numbers, but I also want to keep the good people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: The President said that Elon Musk will use a scalpel, not a hatchet, as they are making these cutting decisions. We know, Jake, that this has not only prompted confusion or lawsuits from some of these fired workers, but even among the own cabinet members who have sought to figure out who has the ultimate authority here, if it's Elon Musk or them. Obviously this meeting was for the president to try to clarify that. We'll see what it changes going forward. But the President did also say there will be bi monthly meetings on exactly this, this power dynamic that's at play and what Elon Musk and his team is doing.

TAPPER: All right, so that's one confusing part of this all. Let's go to a different confusing part of this all, these tariffs. The White house says that Mr. Trump, President Trump is pausing these tariffs on Canada and Mexico again, help make sense of that for us.

COLLINS: Yes, it's a reversal, Jake. There's no doubt about it. Because for weeks officials have insisted that these tariffs were coming. And in recent days, they said there would be no pause, there would not be any of exemptions that we're seeing. Obviously, yesterday were talking about the exemptions that the big automakers were getting for at least one month. They were arguing it was an unfair ground playing field essentially because other countries, Europe and Asia, weren't facing these similar tariff dynamics that the ones that make parts or used parts made out of Canada and Mexico were.

And now with this change today, Jake, basically all of those new tariffs that would be put in place with these tariffs that Trump put in place on Canada and Mexico will not happen, at least not for another month, because if they are part of that trilateral agreement, the trade agreement that Trump negotiated in his first term in office, then they are exempt from this. And so, obviously this is a real question. You've seen the stock market facing this uncertainty in dealing with this, but so are consumers, so are business owners as they are trying to figure out what this looks like, who is getting an exemption and how long it can last. The question is also what happens one month from now, because as we talked about in the briefing yesterday with those automakers, the White House was saying essentially on the expectation of them shifting production, that they should get started on it. Obviously that is something, Jake, that can take years.

And so it is a real question of what happens one month from now. But these businesses themselves don't even know. I mean, the tariffs could go in place in one month from now. There could be exemptions. It remains to be seen. One thing is clear is that it is a very capricious decision making process, Jake.

TAPPER: All right, a good SAT word there. Kaitlan Collins, thanks so much. Look out for Kaitlan on "The Source with Kaitlan Collins." That features Kaitlan Collins tonight at 9:00 Eastern only here on CNN.

Let's bring in CNN's Phil Mattingly, Vanessa Yurkevich, and we're also going to bring in Mark Zandi, who's chief economist for Moody's Analytics.

And Mark, you recently said that the U.S. economy appears to be gagging on the uncertainty, that's your term, created by this economic policymaking which many call haphazard, including the tariff wars, the DOGE cuts back and forth, people hired -- people fired, then rehired, tariffs implemented, then taken back. If this chaos continues, what will that mean? Where will the U.S. economy be?

MARK ZANDI, CHIEF ECONOMIST, MOODY'S ANALYTICS: Jake, it'll grind the economy down. You can feel it already in the stock market, right? You talked about how that's been down, what was it, sliding downhill for two weeks?

TAPPER: Skiing downhill, yes.

ZANDI: Skiing, sorry, skiing downhill, yes, skiing downhill. That's a pretty good barometer of the angst out there among investors and business people. And you know, ultimately that'll affect business investment decisions, hiring decisions. Right now, you know, I think businesses are kind of sitting on their hands. You know, they're not sure what to make of all this.

I don't think they're cutting jobs. I don't think they're cutting investment. That would be a recession. But I do think they're being cautious. You know, they don't really know how this is all going to play out.

And longer drags on the more damage that's going to do. And at some point, you know, it could cause a recession. It's even affecting the Federal Reserve. I mean, the Federal Reserve said point blank when it told us it's no longer going to cut interest rates for a while, but it's not going to do so because it's uncertain about the, you know, economic policy. So, you know, this uncertainty really has real economic consequences.

And we're feeling it already. And that just will get worse as we move forward here, unless this uncertainty is resolved.

[17:10:04]

TAPPER: And Phil, on Capitol Hill, which is a pretty deferential place to President Trump these days, I think that's a --

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's a fair assessment.

TAPPER: It's a fair, and I think I'm being charitable, quite honestly.

MATTINGLY: Kind.

TAPPER: I think I'm being kind. Capital has been rather deferential. But Republican Senator Rand Paul from the Commonwealth that produces 95 percent of the world's bourbon, Kentucky, take a listen to what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. RAND PAUL (R-KY): Almost every industry in Kentucky has come to me and said it will hurt our industry and push up prices of homes, cars. And so I want to continue to argue against tariffs.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Now, Rand Paul and Donald Trump are not best friends, but I'm sure people -- he's not the only one and I'm sure people like him are telling the White House. Do you think Trump hears them? Do you think he cares?

MATTINGLY: It is clear that the message has been passed along. Obviously, the president also gets on the phone with Republican senators on a fairly regular basis, is well known to pick up oftentimes when they call. It's a bit of a rarity for the president. I think the reality is right now, when you talk to advisers around the president, they make, look, this is what he campaigned on. Maybe not this haphazard.

Maybe the 25 percent tariffs on Mexico and Canada weren't exactly in the campaign plans as we laid them out. But his devotion to the idea of using tariffs not just to protect specific manufacturing industries, not just to raise revenue, but also as a negotiating strategy has been very clear and very upfront.

What I will say is the carmakers, the big three auto executives that had a call with President Trump yesterday before he pulled back on the auto tariffs piece of this, give a window into a way that perhaps other executives will be going through. Business matters, markets matter. He cares about those things and he responds to those things or can be responsive to those things. Now, it's important to note, White House officials and Kaitlan got at this, they made clear that those car executives pledged more investment in their manufacturing here in the United States. They'll have 30 days to show that. They're going to have to try and do that. The idea of shifting all their supply chains back here in 30 days is actually impossible --

TAPPER: Right.

MATTINGLY: -- when you think about the technical aspects of it. But whether more executives pursue that and use that as a way to try and get carve outs as we move towards that April 2 deadline for the more expansive tariff regime is a great question.

TAPPER: And Vanessa, what are you hearing from people who would be impacted by this business, people in the agriculture community, consumers?

VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN BUSINESS & POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: Yes. I've been speaking to a lot of business owners and a lot of farmers all day trying to get a sense of where their heads are at. And oftentimes they ask me, well, actually what's the latest just because things are moving so quickly. But I spoke to the American Farm Bureau Federation just a short time ago and they said that they appreciate this pause because 20 percent of farm income comes from exports. That is a critical lifeline for these farmers.

And also a key ingredient called potash. That is something that is used for fertilizer for farmers, 85 percent of that comes from Canada. And that was right ahead of planting season for these farmers. So now that is being exempt. So they're really happy to hear that.

I also spoke to a business owner in Texas. He owns a restaurant there and he gets a lot of his beef and fruits and vegetables from Mexico and Canada. And he told me when I told him that there was now this pause that he is going to place a bulk order, particularly on products that he gets from Mexico, like glasses, like those lava rocks that he uses for guacamole, also tortilla presses. He's going to order that in bulk in this one month pause just to beat potential tariffs that are going to go into effect on April 2nd.

And then Jake, the consumer, how are they going to respond to this? We know that consumer confidence fell last month because of tariffs. Consumers were worried about what tariffs would mean for their bottom line. So it'll be interesting to see where consumers' minds end up as we learn more about where these tariffs are going, Jake.

TAPPER: All right. Fascinating stuff. Phil always buys his lava rocks in bulk as it --

MATTINGLY: I have to.

TAPPER: Is as it is.

MATTINGLY: The only option.

TAPPER: Thanks one and all.

After watching the Trump administration slashing federal jobs by the thousands, moments ago, the president flipped the script.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I don't want to see a big cut where a lot of good people are cut. I want the cabinet members to keep the good people and the people that aren't doing a good job, that are unreliable, don't show up to work, et cetera. Those people can be cut.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: I mean, I guess the question is, is he now limiting the power of Elon Musk and DOGE? Will future cuts be more strategic? Does anybody regret what's been happening for the last six weeks? Someone who's been keeping close track of the cuts is going to join me next.

Plus the overwhelming impact these cuts are having on U.S. military veterans. A senator who represents many of them will be here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:18:56]

TAPPER: More in our politics lead now, the secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs is confirming cuts to his agency which could lead to more than 70,000 employees of the VA, 70,000 losing their jobs. It's a move that in almost any other circumstance would be perceived as politically risky. Republicans would be picketing, calling the president doing this unpatriotic. But this gigantic cut is coming as we're seeing plenty of veterans losing their jobs, not just in the VA, but in agency after agency. A reminder, U.S. veterans make up more than 30 percent of the federal workforce.

And according to the Office of Personnel Management, in 2021 of those veterans who worked for the government, 53 percent of them were disabled veterans. That's who's losing their jobs. Listen to a few veterans describing their experience over the past few weeks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARMY STAFF SERGEANT ALEXZANDRIA HUNT (RET.), VETERAN FIRED BY DOGE: Being cut, I feel as if I was not human. I felt like I was just a number, that one minute I'm here, the next minute I'm gone.

[17:20:07]

CHRISTOPHER WICKER, AIR FORCE VETERAN FIRED BY DOGE: It has felt absolutely chaotic. As a mission focused veteran, it's felt like a letdown for me. And then most importantly, I really hate looking at the communities that I served as the deputy director and knowing that they're the ones who are going to pay the ultimate price.

ADAM MULVEY, 20-YEAR ARMY VETERAN FIRED BY DOGE: I understand there are cuts that need to be made and that there's areas in the budget that can be trimmed, but you don't go about it by just getting rid of every new employee, regardless of what their skill set is or what their tasks are. You make a plan and you adjust the system based on it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: CNN's Brianna Keilar joins me now.

Brianna, we should disclose you're married to a veteran. You are married to a U.S. veteran.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: That's right.

TAPPER: You spoke to one veteran who voted for Trump who's now questioning that after losing his job. He described the cuts to you as feeling like, I mean, this is stark, like the pull out of Afghanistan.

KEILAR: And he was pretty apologetic about describing it like that because he knew what it was to describe something as the pullout to Afghanistan. But his view was this is hurting veterans and it's hurting the people that they're serving, including in flyover states. This is someone from Kansas. Kansas is a pretty red state. And this is a guy who works in the USDA's Natural Resources Conservation Services.

Just to be clear about what we're talking about, formerly the Soil Conservation Services, it was formed during the Dust Bowl to make sure that it doesn't happen again. So, he says, actually, and I pressed him on this, he still very much supports Trump, but he doesn't support the way that he's doing his cuts. And he said, my message to the president is I've got faith in you and I understand what you're doing, but I need you to step back from the situation for a minute and look at the repercussions. You can have all these yes men around you, but you also need some nos.

TAPPER: Yes, I don't know that he's getting no's from the secretary of the Department of Veterans Administration, Doug Collins, who is a veteran himself, he says that these cuts, 70,000 VA employees, it's not going to impact the care of veterans. Is that even possible?

KEILAR: It's hard for advocates to see how that is possible because what these cuts are talking about doing is going back to 2019 levels. That is before the PACT Act was signed in 2022. Which made millions more veterans --

TAPPER: Eligible for veterans, yes.

KEILAR: -- for these benefits because of toxic exposures like that to burn pits. And we should be clear, individual VA hospitals differ. But actually in 2024, the VA reported that while they had a record number of appointments, wait times for both primary care and mental health care were actually down. So that was a good statistic they were reporting. And what we've seen, even with the limited cuts is that some things have been affected.

You know, that some of these veterans crisis line workers were put back in place -- TAPPER: Yes.

KEILAR: -- but the hiring freeze is still affecting some support staff on that crisis line. You're also hearing things like -- we've heard of a local report of a fired worker who managed an understaffed benefits center in Pacific Northwest. Senator Richard Blumenthal on the Veterans Committee said they're hearing from VA employees on operating room closures, ICU bed numbers reduced, inpatient mental health facility cuts. One vet in Norfolk telling one of our affiliates that her mammogram was canceled immediately after these cuts because of staffing shortages. And that's after just a very small number of cuts.

So even though you'll hear over and over right now from people supporting Trump that these are, you know, supporting roles, you're seeing effects already.

TAPPER: All right, Brianna Keilar, thanks so much.

And of course, look out for Brianna on CNN News Central every weekday at 1:00 p.m. Eastern time.

With me now to discuss the Democratic senator of the Commonwealth of Virginia, Tim Kaine, who's on the Senate Armed Services Committee, also the HELP, the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

Senator, your reaction to these massive cuts being made to the VA and the cuts that are affecting so many veterans who work for the federal workforce? I imagine your district workers are hearing from a lot of your constituents directly affected who are veterans.

SEN. TIM KAINE (D-VA): Jake, you're right. And look, I'll give you the punchline. This is a war on veterans. The indiscriminate hiring of federal employees with no strategy trips up veterans more than any other group. As you pointed out, more than 30 percent of the federal workforce is veterans and more than half of those are disabled veterans.

Then let me add to that, the administration has decided to go after probationary employees, which means new employees. New employees come in two varieties. They're either young people coming into the workforce as young workers or they're career switchers who come into the workforce later in life. Who are the career switchers who are probationary? They're veterans.

Veterans finish a five, a 20, a 25 year career, they join the federal civilian service. But even though they've had a lot of service to their country already, when they become a civilian employee for the first time, they're probationers.

[17:25:06]

So the firing of this 30 percent workforce with disproportionate firing of probationers means that Donald Trump has now fired more veterans than any president in the history of the United States in just six weeks. And he's not done. Then add the VA cuts to it and veterans are being punished in a very egregious way right now. TAPPER: Democrats have proposed legislation that would protect veterans in their jobs. Do you think you can get Republican support for that?

KAINE: We are going to try to do that as part of the budget reconciliation bill. Senator Blumenthal and I have also written to the president saying, put veterans back to work with back pay. Go ahead and do it right now before you make matters worse. We haven't gotten a response to the letter. We don't yet have Republicans signing on to legislation.

But I'll tell you this, Jake, it's making them very, very worried, and it should. And we're going to keep being really loud about this until the president decides to quit taking it out on these veterans who have given so much to the country and have so much more still to give.

TAPPER: Let's turn to the Department of Education, because President Trump has been talking about eliminating the department altogether. We don't know when that move will happen or if it will happen, but theoretically, it could happen any day.

The Department of Education, for people who don't know, this, is already the smallest cabinet level agency. It's mostly tasked with distributing federal funds to local schools, particularly to low income and disabled students. What happens if the Department of Education is shut down? Practically speaking, given the fact that most education is running on the state and local level. What would it mean for the DOE to shut down?

KAINE: You're right, Jake. I was a mayor and governor, and education is primarily state and local. But the federal government plays two really important roles. It provides funding for low income schools, Title I, for school nutrition programs, and then significant funding for students with disabilities. What's going to happen to those funds?

We don't know what's going to happen to them. We had the secretary of Education nominee, Linda McMahon, before us, and I asked her a question about the second thing the department does. Hey, listen, who's going to enforce the federal laws guaranteeing students with disabilities get a high quality education if you eliminate the department, even if you send the money to states, if states don't follow the laws to really make sure that kids have the education they deserve, who will enforce it? And her answer was, I don't know. That doesn't give me a lot of confidence.

And what we're going to need is those K12 families to stand up. And then, as you know, the Department of Education also administers the Pell Grant program, Public Service Loan Forgiveness and other important funding mechanisms for higher education. An awful lot of families could not afford to send their kids to school if it weren't for things like Pell Grants.

TAPPER: All right, Democratic Senator Tim Kaine from the great Commonwealth of Virginia, thanks so much. I appreciate it.

President Trump said today he wants his cabinet to take the lead when it comes to job cuts, not DOGE. Does this then sideline DOGE? We're getting into that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I have created the brand new Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE, which is headed by Elon Musk who is in the gallery tonight.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: That was Tuesday. Today, President Trump says he's instructing cabinet secretaries to work with Elon Musk as the head of DOGE on implementing government cuts. Trump described it as taking a, quote, scalpel rather than hatchet to the federal workforce. That likely won't be any consolation of course to the many thousands of workers who have already lost their jobs because of DOGE.

With us now New York Times investigative reporter, David Fahrenthold, who's been closely tracking all of DOGE's actions to the degree that we can because it hasn't really been as transparent as they keep promising. David, what -- what did you make of this new language from President Trump that the secretaries should be making the decisions about layoffs working with Elon Musk and DOGE? Do -- do you see, is this Musk and DOGE being sidelined a bit?

DAVID FAHRENTHOLD, NEW YORK TIMES INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER: It's hard to know because you remember last week in this cabinet meeting, Trump was saying like everybody wants to work with Elon. If you don't work with Elon, you'll be in trouble. He's sort of gone back and forth on this. But to me that the -- the contrast here is between Trump's attention span and Musk's attention span.

Trump drifts from thing to thing. He's on a different topic every day. Musk is single-minded. He really wants to cut government as much as he can. And for that reason I feel like as long as he has that power, as long as Musk has that power, it's going to be him driving the train.

TAPPER: President Trump's getting a lot of pushback from members of Congress including Republicans as well as his own voters, constituents, Republican and conservative economists to these massive DOGE cuts. We saw a result of that in the jobless numbers today. Based on his actions today or at least his comments today do you think the feedback is starting to get to him and what do you think is behind what he said today?

FAHRENTHOLD: I do think the feedback is trying to get to him. Remember Trump didn't really run on this. He didn't talk about when he was running for president, I'm going to cut a whole bunch of services, you're going to have to wait in longer lines at the -- for the IRS or maybe your social security checks won't come. He didn't talk about let's make huge sacrifices so they can be huge cuts. And he didn't govern that way in his first term. So this is really contrary to the sort of promise he'd made to voters. So, yes, I do think he is starting to feel that a little bit. As I said though it's questionable how much impact these words will have. [17:35:08]

TAPPER: Yes. I mean today he did say, I don't want -- I don't want good people cut. I mean and that's completely in contrary -- contrary to what's been going on the last six weeks. On the matter of DOGE's transparency let's talk about this because you have reported on multiple examples of DOGE boasting about massive cuts posting them on their website and then quietly walking them back and taking them down from their website. Just yesterday you reported that DOGE had claimed it had saved taxpayers $53 million by canceling a federal contract that had ended in 2005 but kept going. But you fact-checked the claim and DOGE removed it from its website. What are you hearing from the Trump administration about all these erroneous claims?

FAHRENTHOLD: Really nothing. And we've asked them a lot. And there's been several rounds of this. The original DOGE what they call their wall of receipts where they claim credit for cutting these big government contracts. The original list, the top five items were all wrong and they had to delete them all. Then they put out another list and it turned out that five of the top seven items on that list were wrong and they were deleted. Even now the biggest item on their list is also wrong. It's a contract they're claiming credit for that was actually canceled under Joe Biden. So there has not been a lot of quality control even when they delete old errors they add new errors in.

TAPPER: You know it's so strange because Elon Musk said and this is and it gets repeated by, you know, conservatives on social media. You know we're just human, we're going to make some mistakes but, you know, as soon as we make them we -- we -- we take it back, we fix it. He talked about Ebola and then all these experts on Ebola said no, no, no, you didn't correct it immediately. It actually took a long time and it did have an effect. They -- they are -- there seems to be this like feigning of transparency and feigning of precision that just doesn't square with reality.

FAHRENTHOLD: Yes. To me it sort of runs contrary to what we were told about DOGE in the beginning which was these people have a special set of skills there's -- their whiz kids they have this, you know, incredible ability that will enable them to do things to the government be smart and resize the government in a way that nobody else could. What we're seeing in these errors is that they're making really fundamental mistakes that seem to show they don't really understand the government. They don't understand how contracts work, how contracts are described. And if you're -- if you don't know that sort of basic thing, you know, how could you take a scalpel to the government. How could you know where to cut and what not to if you don't really know what anything is.

TAPPER: Well Republican lawmakers talk about Elon's got these great algorithms and they're finding all this stuff and a good example of how expertise is actually valuable is in the people who supposedly were the 300-year-old, 200-year-old, 150-year-old people are getting social security checks. This was a glitch in the system that people knew about that had been discussed and people have been talking about trying to fix it. None of them got social security checks which is not to say there isn't fraud waste and abuse in social security, there is, they just weren't finding it.

FAHRENTHOLD: That's what's so maddening about this in some ways that there is a lot of fraud and waste and inefficiency in the government and it doesn't seem like what they're doing yet has been at the granular level enough to find it.

TAPPER: Yes, because they don't want to value expertise. David Fahrenthold, thank you so much. Appreciate it.

[17:38:25]

Just in, Canada says it's going to pause a second round of tariffs on the United States after President Trump suspended his own tariffs on Canada and Mexico today. We're going to go to Canada next that's where our friends up north are in the ports working on backup plans before any trade war really heats back up. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: We're back with the Money Lead. And Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau today revealing a bit of the tone in his phone call yesterday with President Trump.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUSTIN TRUDEAU, PRIME MINISTER, CANADA: I can confirm that it was a colorful call. And it was also a very substantive call. There were different sections of the conversation in which different approaches and tones. But I've been having conversations and working with Donald for over eight years now, and a lot of it is rolling with it. A lot of it is figuring out how to -- how to move forward constructively.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Today, President Trump suspended most U.S. tariffs on Canada. Canada has done the same, but Canadians were feeling the pain before all this back and forth started. To see how CNN's John King took his All Over the Map series international and went to Canada's port city of Vancouver.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): British Columbia is a living postcard, scenic mountains and gorgeous waters. The importance of trade is everywhere you look. Canadian lumber waiting at river's edge, rail cars to carry Canadian crude oil, crops and more. The bustling Pacific Rim Port of Vancouver.

PETER XOTTA, CEO, VANCOUVER FRASER PORT AUTHORITY: You'll watch it for eight hours. You'll see on average, we've got 10 ships arriving and 10 ships leaving. We did about 160 million tons of cargo last year, 75 percent of that is those bulk commodities, both grain, coal, potash, sulfur, and -- and other agricultural products outbound.

KING (voice-over): Peter Xotta is the port CEO. XOTTA: It's devastating on both of our economies. We've thrived in North America by having a relatively open economy, and those trading patterns that exist have been mutually beneficial to both countries.

[17:45:01]

KING (voice-over): President Trump paused the tariffs, Thursday, another about face in what is now weeks of on again off again threats. That uncertainty, Xotta says, leaves Canada no choice but to find new markets, new partners.

XOTTA: It's been a wakeup call, right? It's been a wakeup call for Canadians that we need to figure out a way to not be as dependent.

KING (voice-over): This rift goes beyond what Canadians see is Trump's bad math. They are furious at his bad manners, his constant insults, calling Canada the 51st state and its prime minister, governor.

DARRYL LAMB, STORE BRAND MANAGER, CANADIAN RESIDENT: We've been in this together for a long time. We fought wars together. We went to Afghanistan. We did all this stuff together. Why -- what are you doing here?

KING (voice-over): Darryl Lamb is the brand manager at Legacy Liquors. Yes, this too is a front in the new trade war.

LAMB: There's a yellow rose right there from Texas right there.

KING: So is it popular?

LAMB: It is.

KING: And if this goes into effect, you can't sell this.

Lamb: It'll be off the -- off the shelf.

KING: It's gone.

KING (voice-over): Tito's vodka too, also from Texas.

KING: Diagram of a trade war.

KING (voice-over): The premier of British Columbia says his response to Trump tariffs will be to ban sales of alcohol from states Trump won that also have a Republican governor.

LAMB: We've gone through this before with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we were asked to remove all Russian products from our shelves.

KING (voice-over): Lamb says some customers rushed to stockpile American favorites, but others want all American products off the shelves.

KING: So mad at Trump for what he's saying about Canada that they're saying, get it out of here. LAMB: No, 100 percent. Absolutely. I'm just worried about this eternal relationship that we've had for 200 plus years being soured for four.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: And Jake, you see there both pieces of this one is the economics. The Canadian business people say it just makes no sense that this is a thriving economic partnership. It makes no sense. And they say when Trump says tariffs are on and they're off, then they're on and they're off and they're on and they're off. They'd rather than be off. But just the whiplash of all that is messing up their planning.

They say things usually plan nine months out. Now you can go a day or two, maybe a week or two at a time because you don't know what Trump's going to do next. So that's the economics. And then you heard at the end there, it's just the tone. These are our neighbors. They have gone to war with us. They have been partners for a long time.

And when Trump insults their -- them -- insults their prime minister and says 51st state, it's just, forgive my language, it's just pissing. They're -- they're pissed off at the United States. There used to be a friendship and they're all just like, yes.

TAPPER: They fought in Iraq and Afghanistan.

KING: Yes.

TAPPER: The Canadian soldiers.

KING: Yes, they did.

TAPPER: John King, thanks so much.

Coming up next, a big break more than a year after those mysterious deaths involving the three men who gathered at a home to watch a Kansas City Chiefs game. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:52:25]

TAPPER: In our National Lead, for more than a year, law enforcement and the country have tried to unravel the truth behind the mysterious, tragic deaths of three Kansas City Chiefs fans who were found outside a home in below freezing weather last January. And now two men have been charged with killing them. Here's CNN law enforcement correspondent, Whitney Wild.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NORMA CHESTER, MOTHER OF VICTIM: I need them to find out what in the world these boys were doing out in the backyard.

WHITNEY WILD, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For more than a year, their deaths have been shrouded in mystery. STEPHANIE WALLING, RICKY JOHNSON'S NIECE: I never thought it would get as much attention as it has. I mean, I'm hoping that with the attention that it is getting, that it will get us closer to getting answers.

WILD (voice-over): On January 9th, 2024, the bodies of Ricky Johnson, David Harrington and Clayton McGeeney were discovered in the snow outside the home of Jordan Willis two days after the group got together to watch a Kansas City Chiefs football game.

ERIC ZAHND, PROSECUTING ATTORNEY, PLATTE COUNTY, MISSOURI: Detectives then obtained consent to search the home. They found two plastic bags containing white powdery substances.

WILD (voice-over): Now, nearly 14 months later, prosecutors are charging Jordan Willis and another man, Ivory J. Carson, in connection with their deaths.

ZAHND: Mr. Willis and Mr. Carson are both charged with a single count of delivery of a controlled substance and three counts of involuntary manslaughter for recklessly causing the deaths of Mr. McGeeney, Mr. Harrington and Mr. Johnson.

WILD (voice-over): According to a probable cause affidavit, officials say the three men died of a combined fentanyl and cocaine toxicity. According to prosecutors, a witness told police he was at David Harrington's home with McGeeney, Johnson and Willis the night of the football game, where he saw, quote, a large plate of cocaine allegedly supplied by Mr. Willis that everyone was using.

The witness said the three friends were headed to Willis's house after the game, according to prosecutors. Another witness said he was with Willis, Harrington, McGeeney and Johnson at Willis's home later on in the evening, where they drank alcohol, smoked marijuana and used cocaine, according to prosecutors. Authorities also say they have text messages.

ZAHND: The messages allegedly indicate that Mr. Carson supplied Mr. Harrington with cocaine. This case is a tragic reminder of the dangers of street drugs. But -- but make no mistake, the people who supply those drugs can and will be held accountable when people overdose.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WILD: Willis's attorney told CNN that Jordan maintains that he is not responsible for purchasing or supplying the drugs that led to the deaths of his three friends. They say they are very much looking forward to the day a jury gets to hear all of the evidence in this case. Jake, as far as Ivory Carson, there is not a defense attorney listed for him, so we have not yet been able to contact counsel for him. Jake?

[17:55:11]

TAPPER: Whitney, thank you so much. Appreciate that report. President Trump says he met today with his cabinet and has a new plan for all those federal cuts, how he's telling agency leaders and secretaries to handle future firings. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper. This hour, did Elon Musk finally go too far? President Trump calls a cabinet meeting of sorts to clarify how much power the first buddy really has. And it might be less than you think, maybe.

Plus, from TikTok videos to a house for sing along, Democrats trying to find their footing when it comes to being an effective opposition party. Is any of it working?

[17:59:59]

And make milk great again. How Robert F. Kennedy Jr. could use his new role as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services to bring raw milk into the mainstream --