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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Trump Softens Tone Amid Turmoil, No Hardball With China; Trump Says He's Not Considering Powell Firing, Contradicting White House; Source Says, Hegseth's Defense Of Signal Scandal Is Shocking; "60 Minutes" Executive Director Bill Owens Quits; Some Democrats Do The "Dark Woke" Strategy. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired April 22, 2025 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN HOST (voice over): Tonight, back to the future. As brand America bleeds value Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Press rewind on their tough talk.
Plus, tick, tick, tick, the top 60 Minutes producer quits and accuses CBS corporate of telling CBS News how to do its journalism.
Also grading on a curve. MAGA makes excuses for the defense secretary and his growing list of gaps.
And dark woke, Democrats import an online meme to inject some attitude into their messaging.
Live at the table, Scott Jennings, Xochitl Hinojosa, Shermichael Singleton and Chuck Rocha.
Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here, they do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP (on camera): Good evening. I'm Abby Phillip in New York.
Let's get right to what America's talking about, Mr. Softy. Tonight, Donald Trump seems to be signaling to the world that his pledge to play hardball with China is more of a concept of a promise, not an actual promise. Listen to how Trump spent the better part of the month talking about Beijing and how he plans to make them suffer until, of course, he changed his tune today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: I have great respect for President Xi of China, great respect for China, but they were taking tremendous advantage of us.
China was by far the biggest abuser in history and others also. But somebody had to do it. They've really taken advantage of our country for a long period of time. They've ripped us off beyond anybody.
KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Countries like China who have chosen to retaliate and try to double down on their mistreatment of American workers are making a mistake. President Trump has a spine of steel and he will not break.
REPORTER: Are you going to play hardball with them? Are you going to mention COVID?
TRUMP: Well, I'm not. I'm not going to say -- no, I'm not going to mention COVID. I'm not going to say, oh, I'm going to play hardball with China. I'm going to play hardball with you, President Xi. No. We're going to be very nice.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: There is a pretty obvious explanation for why Trump is trying to press rewind on all of that tough talk. That economy the president said he would take care of is currently bleeding. The S&P down 14 percent since the start of the Trump's second term, the Dow is having the worst April since the great depression. The dollar is down 5.5 percent, generational wealth disappearing before the country's eyes.
And now the treasury secretary says that they are trying to say, wait, that was never the plan, that the trade war that Donald Trump said he wanted was not what they're going to get. Scott Bessent told Bloomberg, quote, it was not the U.S.'s goal to decouple from China and that the current status quo of 145 percent tariffs on Chinese goods by the U.S. and 125 percent tariffs on U.S. products was not sustainable.
Joining us in our fifth seat at the table is Charlotte Howard. She's The Economist's executive editor.
Charlotte, what do you think happened here? Did something happen? I mean, a lot happened yesterday, particularly in the markets, but did it spook them and are they starting to realize that this needs to get wound down much more quickly than the 90 days?
CHARLOTTE HOWARD, EXECUTIVE EDITOR, THE ECONOMIST: I think that you had, since Trump took office, a remarkable silence among other people in power, whether it's congressional Republicans or even business leaders, were quite quiet and trying to be supportive of the president. And instead, in the past few weeks, you've seen this roar from the stock market, from investors around the world, from people who are requiring treasuries to have higher interest rates to take U.S. government debt, right? And so I think that Trump has noticed that. I think it has spooked them rightly, right? I mean, if they had completely ignored those signals, it would be somewhat bizarre.
I do think that the question of how Bessent will get out of this, how Trump will get out of this is still open, right? So, they say this situation is not sustainable with over 100 percent tariffs on both sides, that's kind of like saying the sky is blue, that doesn't mean all of a sudden you're in a different situation. So, it's not clear how exactly they're going to wind down from this.
PHILLIP: Yes, I mean, that's the big question. It doesn't seem like there's any progress being made with China. And at the end of the day, that is the whole ball game.
SHERMICHAEL SINGLETON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, no, it is. I think the first step is to probably figure out relationships with some of our allies in Europe, United Kingdom, et cetera. I think agriculture, automotive, I think the tariff imports from the U.S. is around 10 percent.
[22:05:04]
I'd like to see that lower to around 2.5 percent, which is what we have from imports coming in from the E.U. That should be an easy fix. I would argue. I think most of the countries will say, okay, fine. Let's just figure this out.
From the Chinese perspective, though, I think, we really have to figure out a way to protect I.P. We keep talking about this over and over and over again. China says they claim that U.S. companies can essentially file suit in Chinese courts, but it's a lot more com convoluted and more complicated. And if you're a smaller company, most smaller business owners don't have the money to even move forward with that. So, we really need to figure that out. I think that's a step in the right direction.
PHILLIP: All that you're saying is sort of like jumping to the end of the story, because we're right now -- we're like at the beginning of the story. And at the beginning of the story, there's no sign of progress with Europe. There's no sign of progress with China on just the top line number least of all, some of the thorny issues that multiple presidents have dealt with around I.P. And in the meantime, you know, I think some of the things that have really spooked the markets is also Trump's threats around Jerome Powell.
And the other thing I think we have to mark here is that that is also shifting too. As Charlotte was talking about, the markets have been spooked by the tariffs, but they've also been spooked by Trump trying to undermine the economic system. Here's how he's changed on that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Do you think firing Jay Powell is an option now in a way that it wasn't before?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president and the team will continue to study that matter.
TRUMP: I have no intention of firing him, none whatsoever. Never did the press runs away with things. No, I have no intention of firing him. I would like to see him be a little more active in terms of his idea to lower interest rates. It's a perfect time to lower interest rates. If he doesn't, is it the end? No, it's not, but it would be good timing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Never wanted to back down, but he is backing down.
XOCHITL HINOJOSA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, the Fed is obviously independent. It's supposed to be independent. But independence in Trump's head does not exist. He does not understand why a federal government must be independent from himself. He believes that his power and the executive branch's power should dictate what happens with the Fed and with the Department of Justice and with our military, with all of the various things that should be independent.
The reality is, as you talk about, you know, Trump being spooked. It's a little late for Trump to be spooked at this point. We've been talking about tariffs. He has been talking about this for quite some time. The markets are in disarray. We're heading toward a recession. Everybody is saying that this is a terrible thing, and yet, for just now, all of a sudden he woke up and he realized, oh, this is a terrible thing for our economy and our country.
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I just have to respond to your assertion that the federal government should operate independently of the, there are certain elected president of the United States. You mentioned the Fed.
HINOJOSA: There are certain agencies, the Fed, the Department of Justice, FBI.
JENNINGS: Which is obviously appointed and works for the president.
HINOJOSA: No, but it's independent. Your law should not be enforced based on the president. They should be in force based on the law.
JENNINGS: You said the military. Obviously, he's the commander-in- chief of the military. I'm just trying to figure out what percentage or part of the government you think should run away from the president who won an election?
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: I'm going to step in here because I don't want us to change the subject, okay? We are talking about the independence of the Fed. Do you agree or disagree that the Fed should be independent?
JENNINGS: I think the president should be able to render an opinion about monetary policy.
PHILLIP: That is a yes or no --
JENNINGS: Now, whether he should be able to fire him isn't a question.
PHILLIP: That is a yes or no question. Should the Fed be independent of the whims of any president of the United States?
JENNINGS: I think the president ought be able to have opinions.
PHILLIP: Why can't you say yes or no? Shermichael, hold on a second. JENNINGS: I think it's an open question where they should be able to fire the head of the Fed. Some Republican senators don't agree.
PHILLIP: So, Scott, all right --
JENNINGS: But I don't. I just think the idea that the president should not have any opinion about monetary policy is crazy.
PHILLIP: I am going to give you a third try on this one. Should the Fed's decisions about how they operate, the interest rates, when they raise or lower them, should they be independent of the president of the United States?
JENNINGS: Does independent mean they don't take his opinion into consideration?
PHILLIP: Independent means, no, they don't take his opinion into consideration.
JENNINGS: I don't agree with that. I'm sorry. I think the president --
PHILLIP: Hold on.
JENNINGS: I think the president should be able to render an opinion.
PHILLIP: I'm going to ask Charlotte. What do -- you know, this was taken in by the markets, that idea right, this week. What was the reaction among people who are making money, they have businesses, they are operating in the financial word world to this idea that people like Scott believed that the Fed should be listening to the president and act accordingly?
JENNINGS: That's not what I said. You put words in my mouth. I said, should he be able to render an opinion and should the Fed take that any consideration.
PHILLIP: No.
JENNINGS: I think he should be able to have an opinion.
PHILLIP: I didn't say anything --
JENNINGS: And they should take that. He shouldn't be the only thing but he should have an opinion.
PHILLIP: The president can have whatever opinions he wants. What I'm asking is whether the Fed should be independent in their decision- making from those opinions.
[22:10:04]
JENNINGS: I said, does that mean they can take his opinion into consideration, and I think they should take the president's opinion. And that's not the only thing. That's one of the things.
PHILLIP: All right. Well, let me ask if Charlotte has some thoughts on this.
HOWARD: I think it's very clear from the market's response that the most -- not just the desired outcome, you know, the fundamental law of nature needs to be that the Federal Reserve, the chair of the Federal Reserve, makes decisions on monetary policy that are based on economic data, not on the whims of a president. And that's very, very clear.
And I think, you know, the job of the Fed is complex, particularly in the environment in which Trump has placed Jerome Powell, where you have a threat of slowing growth and increasing inflation due to these tariffs, right? So, you have the stagflationary environment. That's very hard for the Fed to manage.
It is true that some investors probably, if Jerome Powell were to lower interest rates, you know, I'm not going to predict how the Fed, the market would respond, however, it's very, very clear that the market responds extremely negatively to even a hint that the president might intervene.
JENNINGS: Intervening and rendering an opinion are two different things.
CHUCK ROCHA, PRESIDENT, SOLIDARITY STRATEGIES: There's a direct effect here with the American worker that has to do with China and with the stock market that people are seeing every day. Donald Trump ran on being tough on China and workers and folks in America, they love that talk, they love being tough on China. But they also love getting really cheap stuff from Walmart and they can't have both at the same time. And I think that's why you see him backing off of that.
With the stock market, regular folks don't understand Dows and bonds and all that. But they understand their 401(k) and I think that's where the pressure's coming from, is people around here saying, you're hurting your own people. And so you see people backing down.
(CROSSTALKS)
JENNINGS: Do you honestly believe the president shouldn't be able to render opinions about monetary policies?
PHILLIP: Scott, you keep repeating something that nobody ever said. No one ever said that Trump cannot have it.
JENNINGS: We're having original thoughts here.
PHILLIP: No, Scott. No one ever said that Trump can't have an opinion. The question is, should the Fed act based on that opinion? And I think it's just common sense, right? The Fed, it should be acting based on economic information and data, not anybody's opinion. Trump is not an economist, and as far as I can tell, does not even have a good grasp on how trade works, which is really problematic if he's going to then turn around and start telling the Fed how to do stuff.
JENNINGS: (INAUDIBLE) we don't want Donald Trump to have influence over the operation of the government. And, you know, I just think it's wrong. PHILLIP: We don't want to have Donald Trump have influence over monetary policy. That is how it has worked. That is where the confidence in this system of economics comes.
JENNINGS: You said monetary policy. She said DOJ, military, FBI. What were the other --
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: Hold on just a second. I'm going to reset because I'm going to change back to the original conversation because, Scott, you are attempting to change the subject multiple times. So, go ahead, Shermichael.
SINGLETON: Sometimes I think we forget history. Let's go back to LBJ. LBJ actually flew the Fed chief down to Texas, his ranch and berated him because he was pissed off about some of his decisions.
PHILLIP: And then what?
SINGLETON: Let's remember.
PHILLIP: And then what?
SINGLETON: I'm going to make --
PHILLIP: No, and then what happened?
SINGLETON: I want to make my point.
PHILLIP: Finish your point. What happened?
SINGLETON: Then George H.W. Bush blamed his Fed chair --
PHILLIP: But, Shermichael, I'm going to pause you there. What happened?
SINGLETON: So, my point is -- that's not all, my God. The point that I'm trying to make --
PHILLIP: Shermichael, tell me what happened.
SINGLETON: History matters here and sometimes --
PHILLIP: It does.
JENNINGS: Shermichael, they want to (INAUDIBLE). They don't want to --
SINGLETON: We talk about Trump.
PHILLIP: No, he is the president of the United States.
SINGLETON: Can I finish my freaking statement?
PHILLIP: No.
SINGLETON: You just interject. I haven't concluded my thought process.
PHILLIP: I want to pause here.
SINGLETON: So, the point is --
PHILLIP: Shermichael --
SINGLETON: -- there have been previous presidents that had similar thought process as to Fed as Trump. That's a simple position I'm trying to make here.
PHILLIP: I want to pause on your half-finished history lesson. What did the Fed do after LBJ brought him down to his ranch?
SINGLETON: Listen, to LBJ or George H.W. Bush.
PHILLIP: So, what is your point?
SINGLETON: The point is, previous presidents have been of the mindset similar to Trump that I don't like the decision of the Fed chair, I would like the chair to change their particular opinion.
PHILLIP: I feel like I am in an alternative universe here in which you guys keep telling me that I'm saying Trump doesn't deserve to have an opinion. He's a human beings. He's a president of the United States. He can have whatever opinions he wants.
SINGLETON: That's not what I said. I said that we're forgetting history.
PHILLIP: The question is, where is the historical --
SINGLETON: Trump isn't the first president to berate or dislike the position of the Fed chair. That's my point.
PHILLIP: Where is the historical analogy for the Fed acting on the desire of a president to behave in a particular way and doing so while ignoring economic data? Where is the evidence of that?
SINGLETON: That's not the premise of my argument. The premise of my argument is pretty simple. We're making this as if it's breaking news that Trump has a thought process about the Fed he wants restraint and act a certain way.
PHILLIP: You cannot bring history about this if you don't want to finish the history.
SINGLETON: So have previous presidents.
PHILLIP: You're not finishing the history, Shermichael.
SINGLETON: Okay. Well, what history am I forgetting here?
PHILLIP: You can't bring it into the conversation --
SINGLETON: Please inform me. PHILLIP: You cannot bring it into the conversation if it is not germane.
SINGLETON: Oh, come on, Abby.
PHILLIP: If the Fed did not act on that berating, then how is that a parallel?
SINGLETON: So, I don't know how I can be more clear or provide more clarity here. I never stated that the Fed and either of the instances that I provided acted on the thought process or advice or anger of previous presidents.
[22:15:06]
PHILLIP: Well, great.
SINGLETON: My point is that Trump is acting in a similar manner of previous presidents and we cannot ignore that there.
PHILLIP: There's precedents for presidents having opinions. Thank you for that. But there is not precedent for the Fed acting on those opinions.
SINGLETON: That's not my argument.
PHILLIP: We got to leave it there we are well over time, unfortunately. Charlotte Howard, thank you very much for joining us. Everyone else stick around.
Coming up next, new reporting tonight on Pete Hegseth and all of his scandals. We're learning that some of his closest advisors are still considering resigning as sources call his T.V. appearance today shocking.
Plus, the top producer at 60 Minutes is out in protest saying that the show's independence has been compromised in the wake of Trump's lawsuits. Another special guest is going to join us in our fifth seat.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:20:00]
PHILLIP: Tonight, Donald Trump is said to be working the phones and asking for feedback about Pete Hegseth as the chaos inside of the Pentagon gets worse. Sources are telling CNN that while Trump does not have any plans to fire the defense secretary, some of Hegseth's own closest advisers are thinking about quitting over all of his turmoil. And even White House officials are raising concerns. One source describes Hegseth's mood over the last month as full paranoia, back- against-the-wall mode.
Now, today, the former T.V. host booked himself on Fox and Friends where he used to work. The purpose of that visit was to show face and, of course, correct what has been a disaster of a month marred by resignations inside of the Pentagon and scandals about two separate Signal chains. But a source with direct knowledge of that second chat says that Hegseth's comments were, quote, an eyebrow-raising attempt to mislead and a shocking obfuscation and that the chats included details that, quote, doesn't belong outside of a SCIF.
The guy who interviewed him may have said the quiet part out loud today. He suggested that everyone cut Hegseth some slack because he's inexperienced.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BRIAN KILMEADE, FOX NEWS HOST: Totally accurate. If it wasn't for the leakers leaking out the Signal chat, then nobody would know this. Number two is it was a secure line that they're talking. Should you be saying that to friends and family? That's another thing. It also could be part of a learning curve.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: A learning curve, Scott, in this meritocratic administration. A learning curve at the Pentagon?
JENNINGS: Yes. I have some public relations advice for these folks. If I were Secretary Hegseth, I wouldn't do any more media interviews right now. The best way to prove you can do the job is to do the job. And, by the way, with the attacks on the Houthi rebels, the recruitment being up in the military, there are aspects of his job that are going quite well. He needs to focus on that and just get a handle on doing the job. The media piece, leave it aside for the moment.
And for the White House, my advice would be whatever guidance you gave the cabinet and your senior officials about the use of Signal and other encrypted applications, just release it. Whatever memo went out, whatever the lawyers gave everybody after the first Signal thing, just put it out so that everybody can see what directives have been given since the initial tempest in a teapot brewed over.
PHILLIP: To this first point, I just want to play something a little bit more of this interview because I think it was really striking. Here is Pete Hegseth talking about the people that he hired who he then either reassigned or fired and what he's describing as the forces that are working against him.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KILMEADE: Do you think there's a lot of people don't want you there and there's some type of steep deep state forces that want to make sure you don't stay there?
PETE HEGSETH, DEFENSE SECRETARY: They've come after me from day one, just like they've come after President Trump. I mean, I've gotten a fraction of what President Trump got in that first term. What he's endured is superhuman.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROCHA: I think it's really important for folks that are talking about this, especially him, to know that the folks aren't silent sources. A guy wrote an op-ed who worked with him, who worked with him in his nonprofit. And to Scott's point about P.R., if you're doing this and you're thinking about doing this and all the things with your wife and the lawyers.
I like to talk about the American worker. American worker and the American voter may not know what USAID is, just like this political consultant, didn't know every move of that. They know what the Department of Defense is and they expect really big things out of the Department of Defense, and I'll just leave it at that.
PHILLIP: That's a fair point. I mean, DOD is one of those things that historically you don't mess with. I mean, I thought this was so striking in our reporting tonight, Hegseth's most trusted advisers are now his wife, his lawyer, and his junior military aide who he may now appoint as his chief of staff. But there are others, a retired army sergeant who served with Hegseth in Afghanistan, and some of those people, including this gentleman, have gotten so frustrated with the turmoil that they've indicated to colleagues that they may resign, according to two sources.
HINOJOSA: I think that, first of all, it was his wife and his brother who were on this Signal chat. The mishandling of classified information is a serious one. General Petraeus pled guilty for mishandling classified information and sharing classified information with his lover. You had Jack Teixeira just last year. He was sentenced at 15 years in prison for sharing classified information with his buddies.
So, the federal government has historically taken this type of matter extremely seriously, and especially when you're putting people's lives at risk. And so the fact that he is bringing in his closest family members, friends to kind of advise him in such a serious job when you have a whole bunch of people who have security clearances and you can have briefings from these people in SCIFs, I mean, is just astonishing.
[22:25:11]
And I think that to give more communications advice, they should stop attacking the whistleblowers. These aren't leakers. These are whistleblowers. The reason --
PHILLIP: And they're not even --
HINOJOSA: And they have protection.
PHILLIP: I don't think you can describe them as whistleblowers because they just got -- first of all, they were just hired by him. Many of them still support him. They just are being, you know, in their view, forthcoming and saying, the way that this has been going cannot continue. SINGLETON: It's a large organization. You want to minimize operational disruption. I would imagine the president can't necessarily be too happy about this granted they spent a lot of political capital trying to get Pete Hegseth confirmed. So, I understand why the president, at least for now, is standing behind him.
Look, you have great think tanks out there, Heritage Foundation, great organization, they can reach out to Heritage, hey, we need some folks with expertise in X, Y, Z military strategies or backgrounds here. Give us a list of individuals we can bring on as advisers to the secretary. I will start there. Many of those individuals have years of experience working in the previous administration.
PHILLIP: Do you think Trump should let him go?
SINGLETON: That's for the president to ultimately decide.
PHILLIP: But, I mean, it sounds like you think that there are more qualified people.
SINGLETON: No. I think he should select qualified advisers to advise him, being the secretary, that is.
PHILLIP: To advise Pete Hegseth?
SINGLETON: Of course. There are talented --
PHILLIP: Last thing, out of curiosity, just because I'm curious what you think, do you think that it is appropriate for the defense secretary to be talked about as needing to almost like be coached by people around him who are maybe more professional, maybe more experienced, maybe have the management skills? Is that what you're describing here?
SINGLETON: Well, even the president has advisers who are experts on certain things advising him, and he's the president of the United States. I mean, this is not an anomaly.
PHILLIP: I'm not talking about advice, I'm talking about other people who can right his ship. He's supposed to be the head, the captain of the ship, right. You're describing surrounding him by people who can help him right his own ship. Why isn't the onus on him to manage the Pentagon?
SINGLETON: What I'm describing, if you're a leader, I run a business, I don't know every single thing. We hire people who are experts in certain arenas to help advice me and my business partner, co-CEO, to run our business. I would hope that every cabinet secretary is surrounded by experts on a litany of things to help them make the right decisions. I would imagine everyone would want that type of behavior.
HINOJOSA: I think the secretary of defense is one where you don't want him learning on the job. You want a secretary --
SINGLETON: That's not what I'm saying. HINOJOSA: You want a secretary of defense who is going to be one of the smartest people in the room and is going to listen to his generals and it's --
SINGLETON: So, did your boss not have advisers when you were in the government?
HINOJOSA: Absolutely, advisers. But I'll tell you, the attorney general is always the smartest person in the room.
SINGLETON: The smartest person that's good in everything.
HINOJOSA: No, being lawyer and attorney general.
SINGLETON: That's why you have advisers because no one an expert.
HINOJOSA: He wasn't expert in education.
SINGLETON: So, why are we sitting here pretending that these people asking don't have advisers?
HINOJOSA: He should just be an expert on defense.
PHILLIP: Look, I kind of feel like we're having an argument about something that we really don't usually have arguments about in this country. Prior defense secretaries have been so supremely qualified to do their jobs that we don't really talk about these things. So, the fact that we're having this conversation and saying, well, does he know everything? Does he not know everything? I think the question is, does he know what he needs to know in order to run the largest part of the federal government?
JENNINGS: I think he knows what he needs to know to do what Donald Trump wants him to do at the Pentagon, which is an enormous task to reform a bureaucracy of that size. But it would be folly to think you can do it alone, or with just a small handful. It requires a large team to run a massive bureaucracy like that.
And if I were President Trump in that particular job, I would want to make sure that my secretary of defense was surrounded by advisers who've not just had expertise in whatever their area is, but also had loyalty to the president's agenda to make sure that my aims for the building were being carried out on a daily basis.
PHILLIP: That sounds like Secretary Pete Hegseth's job to surround himself with the people that he needs. And it sounds like that's actually the thing.
JENNINGS: It's usually worked with the president on personnel staffing. That's common.
PHILLIP: But it sounds like that's actually the part of it that he has, I mean, I guess to his own admission, failed to do because he's then turned around and fired all these people. So, I think that, you know, remains part of the problem that he is facing. Coming up next, the longtime producer of 60 Minutes suddenly quit, saying that the show's independence has been compromised, as Donald Trump is suing the network. A special guest is going to join us in our fifth seat.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:30:00]
PHILLIP: Tonight, a chilling warning about the first amendment. Bill Owens, the executive producer of "60 Minutes" is quitting, giving up maybe the most esteemed job in journalism because he says that CBS won't let him do that job. In a memo obtained by CNN and sent to the "60 Minutes" staff, Owens told his colleagues that the CBS C suite made it clear that, quote, he "would not be allowed to run the show as I have always run it" or make, quote, "independent decisions based on what was right for "60 Minutes".
Now, this is happening in the middle of a major legal fight between CBS and the president. Donald Trump is suing the network over an interview with Kamala Harris, an interview that Trump claims the network edited and grossly misled the viewers.
[22:35:00]
Now, most legal experts say that that lawsuit won't hold water but the players matter here, not necessarily the game. Sherry Redstone, Paramount's controlling shareholder, has said that she wants to settle this. She is in all in limbo as well, waiting on Trump and the administration to approve a multi-billion dollar sale of the company. Owens says that his former show is falling victim to corporate greed. Quote, "the show is too important to the country, it has to continue, just not with me as executive producer."
Joining us in our fifth seat at the table is Jeff Jarvis. He's a journalism professor and the author of the Gutenberg parenthesis. Jeff, this is, I guess, maybe an inevitability of what we thought was happening over at CBS, which is that maybe the corporate overlords are putting a lot of pressure on the news organization wanting to settle this lawsuit so they can eventually get a paycheck at the end of the day.
JEFF JARVIS, JOURNALISM PROFESSOR: I've been there. I started the magazine "Entertainment Weekly" 35 years ago, and when we were merging at Time Inc. with Warner Brothers, sorry, pressure was put on me to be nice to Hollywood suddenly. I quit as a result so the magazine could live in a better path.
So, I respect what Owens has done here. I think it's important. Co- corporate pressure exists in every job, we all see that. But in this case, there is a bending of the knee to Trump. Now the problem is, I don't know that him quitting is going to make a bit of difference --
PHILLIP: Yeah.
JARVIS: -- in what happens next, because Sherry Renstone has shown that she'll bend the knee. I wish that they were more like Harvard and less like Columbia. But I think that -- that Paramount CBS has shown where they stand right now.
PHILLIP: What is --
JARVIS: And they're going to be bought by Larry Ellison's son, and Ellison is a friend of Trump. So, I don't see shiny days ahead of the time.
PHILLIP: Things are not getting better. I mean, but what do you think is the consequence of him quitting? I mean, we've -- we've seen a lot of different reactions to Trump pressure. There's Harvard and the -- and the lawsuit, but then there's also Columbia and the caving.
CHUCK ROCHA, PRESIDENT, SOLIDARITY STRATEGIES: I think there's -- it's like a senior consultant in a campaign. Everything, I know, you all, everything's a campaign with me, but stay with me here. It's like, they're the last person in the room. They're helping guide the ship. They're -- they're not the main actor. The campaign, the candidate is the main actor.
You're there to try to keep everything running on Trump and make sure that it's, I guess, ethical or staying in the middle of the road or whatever your thing may be. You have influence over that. If he's gone, who has that influence?
PHILLIP: But it's bringing attention to this.
XOCHITL HINOJOSA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yeah, I think that the problem is, first, you had the ABC settlement, that was a few months ago. And then if you now have a CBS settlement, he's going after "The Associate Press". A judge just ruled in Voice of America's favor today. So, you have -- the media will succeed in somewhat just like you're reporting earlier.
I mean, if CBS were allowed this to move forward, it's likely going to be in their favor, but there are entities that institutions that feel like they need to bend the knee to Donald Trump. And this isn't just about the media. It is about law firms. It is about universities. It is about potential non-profits. It is about --
JARVIS: And it's not just about bending the knee. It's also about paying bribes to Trump. The ABC settlement was nothing short of Bakshis.
HINOJOSA: Yes.
JARVIS: And the CBS settlement would be the same.
HINOJOSA: And it sets a terrible precedent. I mean, one of the things that Trump is trying to do is he's trying to silence the media. And by having these agreements with ABC and potentially CBS, with law firms, with, you know, with potential universities, it's silencing institutions that don't agree with him. And that is where I think the American people should be worried about.
JARVIS: And a first American violation to be sure.
HINOJOSA: Absolutely.
SHERMICHAEL SINGLETON, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Look, I -- I understand, Sherry Redstone's position. She's a majority shareholder. She has a fiduciary responsibility to the other shareholders to try to get this deal done.
I know if I owned a percent of it, I'd certainly tell you, you need to figure this out by any means necessary. As it pertains to the gentleman resigning, I mean, to your point, Jeff, I don't know what significance this will hold. I don't know what percent of Americans still watch "60 Minutes".
PHILLIP: Would you, I mean, you said figure it out. Do you -- would you -- you said figure it out. Would you advise that Sherry Redstone to do what is being alleged here, which is perhaps pressure CBS?
SINGLETON: I just know in business, when there's a deal of this magnitude on the table, your shareholders do not want that deal.
JARVIS: Shermichael, what does this do to the value of CBS, the former Tiffany Network? When people cannot know whether to trust it anymore, when they wonder what stories they'll -- they'll be, and I know you laugh, Scott, because you've been the one with trust.
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think people have lost trust in it for a lot of reasons. But it's nothing to do with this deal.
JARVIS: But I think now, the problem is that it ruins its brand --
SINGLETON: No, I --
JARVIS: -- with an audience who did trust and did care about them, and that affects the value of the company.
SINGLETON: No, Jeff. I -- I take that point. I would just -- I guess I would offer a different position here. If I were to run CBS, my bigger question would be how do I maintain whatever market share I have? And right now, they got a viewership problem. So, I'm not really sure --
PHILLIP: "60 Minutes" really have a -- I mean, "60 Minutes" is different from --
(CROSSTALK)
UNKNOWN: Oh, yes. That's the whole way. Is the bigger point.
(CROSSTALK)
[22:40:00]
PHILLIP: Magazine.
JARVIS: The bigger question is that mass media are dying. I hate to say this in the middle of the spectrum.
PHILLIP: Yeah, we -- we all know that.
JARVIS: Mass media are dying. And so, if you try to think that we're going to be, please everybody, those days are over. You've got to stand on some principle. You've got to stand for something. You've got to be somewhere in this -- in this spectrum.
And if you think you're just going to make nice to everybody, the problem is that the right wing, hello, Scott, has, taken advantage of this situation, I think, quite cleverly, quite wisely. They've played into a weakness.
JENNINGS: What situation?
JARVIS: The situation of media being under attack. And so, they've created a situation where --
JENNINGS: You've almost got it. Keep going. What -- what the right wing is taking advantage of is finally the American people saying enough is enough. They're tired of feeling like the mass media screens out one viewpoint versus another in political coverage. They're tired of media institutions favoring one party over another.
They're tired of narratives over factual stories. If I had any advice for "60 Minutes" or anybody else, it would be just cover the news and try to be fair about it and stop putting your finger on the scale, especially during the pandemic.
JARVIS: That's -- that's -- you're -- you're talking about the old mass media myth, that you could have this thing that was in the middle. The Walter Cronkite saying, that's the way it is, when it wasn't for many Americans the way it was, when people were pissed off.
JENNINGS: People -- but people back in those days trusted the media.
JARVIS: No, they just couldn't be heard because there was no truth. And now that we have the Internet
JENNINGS: Look at the gallop talk. It was here, and now it's here. It's fallen off of a cliff.
PHILLIP: Yeah, we -- we do have -- we do have that gala polling about trust in media. And now, as in recent years, and let's be honest, Scott. A lot of this is driven by the rhetoric on your side of the aisle. I mean, it's not --
JENNINGS: You think it's driven by the rhetoric and not the performance?
PHILLIP: Absolutely. Okay. On the question of whether what is at -- what is -- what is Trump's interest in this? That's -- that's one of the question. Is it to have media that is in the middle, that is fair? Here is just a sampling of what has been happening at the White House as Trump has -- he's entitled to do this, but invited very sycophantic media into the White House. Listen. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BRIAN GLENN, "REAL AMERICA'S VOICE" CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Why don't you wear a suit? And you refuse to wear a suit. Just want to see if you -- do you own a suit?
CARA CASTRONUOVA, LINDELLTV: Correct. Will you guys also consider, releasing the president's fitness plan? He actually looks healthier than ever before. Healthier than he did eight years ago, and I'm sure everybody in this room could agree. Is he working out with Bobby Kennedy, and is he eating less McDonald's?
MIKE CARTER, NEWSMAX: The clothes have emerged of Senator Van Hollen sipping what appears to be, margaritas with Abrego Garcia down in El Salvador. Do you encourage other Democrats to fly down to El Salvador to meet with this illegal alien who's an accused wife beater?
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I like this guy. See now, this is -- this is the kind of a reporter we like.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Trump is not interested in middle of the road Walter Cronkite reporting, and I think it's also completely ahistorical to describe Walter Cronkite as somebody who did not have a point of view as he very famously did. But Trump is -- but Trump is not interested in that, Scott. He's not.
JENNINGS: Of course he's not. No. Look. No politician, no president, Democrat or Republican, wants to be pilloried every day, and all of them believe they're being treated unfairly, and they all want to be treated better than they think they're being treated. That's true for all of them.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: So, is this about trust in media or is it about bringing in more media that is favorable to him? I think that's the question.
JENNINGS: But my point is this, if you're CBS or any other news outlet, the reason that you have lost trust ought to be obvious to you and the way to fix it also ought to be obvious to you and it has nothing to do with Donald Trump and everything to do with the product. Just try to make a better product that appeals to more people and the way you appeal to more people is by not crapping on half or more than half of the country because of their values and political views.
PHILLIP: I think that that is a fair, just -- if we were sort of on another planet out of context, it is a fair description of what is necessary in this moment. But I think in the context of this particular moment, where the pressure is coming from up high, the question is what does the administration want? What would be the price that Sherry Redstone has to pay in order to get a yes on their job?
JARVIS: There's no price you could pay. Look at what happened with Columbia. Look what happened to law firms. Look what happened with the "A.P." If you bend the knee, you get kneecapped. And I think to the point of "The Associated Press", what should have happened is the rest of the press should have walked out.
I was at an event at Columbia yesterday where the -- the dean of the journalism school there asked that question of A.G. Sulzberger of "The New York Times". And there was resistance to that idea. But as Jelani Cobb, the dean of Columbia said, what you'd end up with in that press room then is, and these are my words, the freak show that you had Trump wants. Trump tries to devalue media. Why should we value his freak show there? Let's let leave it to the freaks.
ROCHA: I think there's one more thing that we're not talking about. We're walking into White House correspondent dinner weekend, and I'm seeing corporate sponsors and other folks who want to give money to good things like giving scholarships to journalism students, an event that I host, where corporations want nothing to do with it because it's hosted by a brown guy because they're like, we're not doing DEI this year because we don't want to be punished.
[22:45:02]
SINGLETON: I would just say quickly here, if you look at the media landscape now, it is more democratized where people are getting and sourcing their information from. It does come from a lot of these non- traditional places.
So, if you're the White House and you want to communicate with at least a third of the country and maybe they're watching Joe Rogan or someone else, I would argue it makes sense to have individuals representative from these spaces there.
JENNINGS: But they're not freaks. I think calling them freaks, is -- is --
PHILLIP: I don't think there's any disagreement on that, by the way.
JENNINGS: I mean, he called -- he called these new media sources the freak show. They're not freaks. They have audiences.
UNKNOWN: Some of them are.
JENNINGS: They have audiences, and there's a reason that they're thriving, is because people are starved for information that they think they can trust. They're not freaks. They're filling a need in this country in my opinion.
PHILLIP: All right. And I assume you all would disagree on that. We can't get into every single --
JENNINGS: Of course.
PHILLIP: - one of these sources because some of them are indeed questionable. Jeff Jarvis, thank you very much for joining us. Everyone else, stay with us. Coming up next, some Democrats are going, quote, "dark woke". Hear what that means as liberals begin to lose patience. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JENNIFER WELCH, "I'VE GOT IT" PODCAST HOST: That is such (BEEP). That is total (BEEP). That is buying into the right-wing media narrative, and I'm so sick of Democrats like you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:50:50]
PHILLIP: Tonight, "dark woke". Democrats are trying to turn a MAGA insult that they're too politically correct and too polite on its head by debuting an edgier, occasionally more profane brand of messaging.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNKNOWN: If you could speak directly to Elon Musk, what would you say?
REP. JASMINE CROCKETT (D) TEXAS: (BEEP) off.
BRIANNA KELLAR, CNN ANCHOR: Do you think that calling Elon Musk a dick (ph) is effective messaging?
REP. ROBERT GARCIA (D-CA): Well, he is a dick (ph).
SEN. ADAM SCHIFF (D) CALIFORNIA: I'm a good Democrat, so my view, of course, is when they go low, we go high. He can go (BEEP).
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Just let the F bombs fly, I guess. Is that a -- is that a strategy?
JENNINGS: Occasionally a person named? Occasionally, it's like all the time now.
HINOJOSA: Yes, Sir. This doesn't work. Usually, we tried to do this in 2017 when we lost everything, and I will say there were headlines like this, and it was not great. I would -- I would air on the side of being a Cory Booker and being passionate about how people are -- how their lives are being upended because of Donald Trump's policies instead of going off and saying the F word and going off and calling Donald Trump some crazy name or whatever that is.
PHILLIP: It's great for the base. It's just --
HINOJOSA: It's great for the base, but if you want to --
(CROSSTALK)
UNKNOWN: - feel differently, don't you?
UNKNOWN: I do, but --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Just -- just let him -- just let him here, okay?
(CROSSTALK)
ROCHA: -- for the better. Listen to me, Democrats. The same people that was running our campaigns in 2012 and 2077 -- 2017, slow down, Chuck, and 2020 are the same people. That's what's wrong. You're trying too hard. You're trying too hard because some poster and some P.R. consultant said, you got to be tough like Donald Trump, when all you got to do is get back to being Democrats, get back to the message that Donald Trump stole from us, and be authentic. You know, I was doing a podcast last week speaking to New Zealand.
HINOJOSA: We're actually right here.
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: What message did he steal pretty tell?
ROCHA: I talk about it all the time on here about why join the Democratic Party. Oh, you, love, I am not saying it damn.
PHILLIP: Party for a Sunday. Okay. I-- I think actually this is really, germane to this conversation. Let me just play for you a kind of extraordinary moment with Rahm Emanuel, a long time, obviously, prominent Democrat. He was on a podcast with a progressive, and here's how it went.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNKNOWN: We were really south on kitchen table issues. The only room we do really well was the bathroom, and that's the smallest room in the house.
WELCH: That is such (BEEP). That is total (BEEP). That is buying into the right-wing media narrative, and I'm so sick of Democrats like you selling out and saying this. You know who talks about trans people more than anybody? MAGA. We kind of fight. They're the gender obsessed weirdos, not us. We're the ones who fight for Social Security. We fight for Medicare. And, yeah, we're not going to bully trans people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROCHA: That's what I mean. I need another white woman telling me what to do.
JENNINGS: I was going to say, I mean, with all due respect to our colleague, him getting yelled at by one of these liberal white ladies on a podcast is like the -- Shermichael and I cannot get --this is the content America needs.
SINGLETON: We're all going to bet.
JENNINGS: Getting yelled at by liberal white lady.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Okay. But I think she was making your point, Chuck, which is essentially the solution is not to become more like Shermichael and Scott. The solution is for Democrats to be actually Democrats.
ROCHA: Look, I'm a non-college educated brown man who was a teenage father when I was 19. I remember what it was like going to a payday lender to buy diapers. That's really hard, but that's where the regular people are every day. We have to start showing up back where regular people are and not being this overeducated whatever the thing is. You don't have to be a Republican. You can be a Democrat and still be cool. I'm living proof of that every day.
JENNINGS: Now, it is true.
PHILLIP: You can be a Democrat.
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: You know, my dad, working class guy, worked in a factory, garbage man for a while was the biggest Clinton guy I knew in the '90s. He was the first guy to tell me Donald Trump was going to be the next President of the United States and of course, I told him he was full of it. And I was wrong and he was right. And I think about that all the time because all of those Clinton guys that you're talking about was working class guys from the '90s, they're all Trump guys now. And that's also explained some of the evolution of the Republican platform, but that base of the party is gone.
[22:55:00]
SINGLETON: A lot -- a lot of it and Chuck talks about this a lot. We text about this often. He's really the only Democrat that I hear who speaks about the values of working-class people. I mean, most Democrats that -- that I know, they're corporate people. They're pretty much elitist. They go to, you know, great institutions, and they really aren't in touch with what every day people go through in terms of their struggles daily. They should listen to you, Chuck.
ROCHA: I'm thinking for the commercial, but we can get back to there, and there's a way to get back. Sorry, Abby.
PHILLIP: Well, hey. I -- I think that there are probably more Democrats than Chuck, including the guy he -- he used to work for, who are doing that. But the question is, are they being listened to in the Democratic Party?
UNKNOWN: Want them.
PHILLIP: Coming up next -- everyone, thank you very much. Thank you for watching "NewsNight". Elon Musk says that he is leaving DOGE soon as Tesla profits tank. Laura Coates has Kara Swisher joining her. Stand by for that.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
