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South African Pres. Challenges Trump's Genocide Claims During Tense Oval Office Exchange; Trump Plays Video for South African President Pushing Unsubstantiated Claims of Genocide; Soon: Trump Meets with GOP Holdouts Amid Tax Bill Impasse; Urgent Manhunt for 5 Louisiana Escapees; 5 Others Captured; DOJ Opens Criminal Inquiry into Andrew Cuomo. Aired 6:30-7p ET

Aired May 21, 2025 - 15:00   ET

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

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BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: President Donald Trump pushing unsubstantiated claims of white genocide during a tense Oval Office meeting with South Africa's president, with Trump's counterpart pushing back in front of cameras and defending his country's land policies.

Plus, a Holdout Huddle: Just minutes from now, President Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson are set to meet some hardline conservatives who say that, at least for now, they will not support Trump's Big, Beautiful Bill.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: And five of the 10 men who escaped the New Orleans jail are still on the run. The sheriff leading the manhunt, halting her reelection campaign, as questions mount over how this happened.

We're following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to CNN News Central.

SANCHEZ: We start this hour with the White House, where just a short time ago, President Donald Trump and the Oval Office repeatedly made some unsubstantiated claims about white genocide in South Africa. The president of South Africa, who was sitting right next to Trump, said he came to reset relations with Washington and to talk about trade. But when Trump brought this up, he pushed back.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CYRIL RAMAPHOSA, SOUTH AFRICAN PRESIDENT: People who do get killed, unfortunately, through criminal activity, are not only white people. The majority of them are black people. And we have now been utilized ...

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The farmers are not black.

RAMAPHOSA: We are now ...

TRUMP: I don't say that's good or bad, but the farmers are not black. (END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Now, Trump, at one point during this contentious exchange, turned down the lights and play a video on it, a minute. It showed several propaganda items from a white Afrikaner lobby group that's been criticized as white nationalist.

With us now is CNN Chief National Affairs Correspondent, Jeff Zeleny. This was an extraordinary moment, Jeff.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: As it was. I mean, it unfolded basically as an ambush, I mean, right there in the Oval Office. We've seen so many of these Oval Office meetings before with the White House, the President and other visiting dignitaries. This had the feel, the contention of the one we all remember, I think, from a Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The topic, of course, totally different.

But the White House and the President of the Trump administration have been espousing these false theories for several weeks and months, actually. And in Trump's case, it's several years. He's talked about the white Afrikaners being subject to genocide at Trump rallies.

And just a couple of weeks ago, they had some political rain into the U.S. Of course, the reason that this is such an important point is the Trump administration has effectively stopped the other refugee program from around the world, except for this.

But it unfolded in this critical moment when the President was asked this about white genocide.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What does it take from you - for you to be convinced that there's no white genocide in South Africa?

RAMAPHOSA: Well, I can answer that for the President. It's for him ...

TRUMP: I'd rather have him answer that.

RAMAPHOSA: I know the answer to that. It would be ...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My president will respond to you. Thank you, Mr. President.

RAMAPHOSA: It will take President Trump listening to the voices of South Africans, some of whom are his good friends, like those who are here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZELENY: You can feel and you can see and just sense the tension right there when President Trump asked that question. President Ramaphosa answered the question. But look, it unfolded like any leader meeting that I can recall. The only difference than the Zelenskyy meeting, the Vice President and members of the Cabinet did not weigh in and pounce on him as well.

SANCHEZ: Notably, the President came with these video montages and these articles, these stories of farmers being killed. Clearly, the White House orchestrated this to give off a certain impression.

ZELENY: There's no doubt about it. I mean, for all the Oval Office's meetings we've been in, we've all been in them. We've all covered the White House. I can't recall audiovisual equipment in the Oval Office when there's been a presidential leader there. So clearly, these videos were keyed up.

The president - the visiting president, had no context to what these were, so was sort of unable to describe. But the White House knew what they were. Then the President was going through - the American president was going through clips from the Daily Mail and other places. So, it was clearly, that's why I used the word ambush, clearly used as a setup.

And the South African delegation was there to talk about the economy, was trying to reset the relations, and it clearly was anything but that.

KEILAR: President Ramaphosa made this comment at one point that caused some laughter, I think even from Trump, which was about not having a plane to give him, although he wished, I think, that he could give one to him.

[15:05:04]

ZELENY: That was sort of a funny moment because our friend Peter Alexander from NBC News asked a question right after the briefing played about the news that was made about the Pentagon accepting this Qatari Air Force One, if you will or what could be the Air Force One.

KEILAR: Which just happened.

ZELENY: It had just happened moments ago. And President Ramaphosa, you know, was sort of trying to add a bit of levity, perhaps, saying, we wish we had a plane.

TRUMP: And President Trump did respond. He said, we would take it.

KEILAR: Yes.

ZELENY: He's probably right. They probably would take a second plane.

KEILAR: Trump was pretty pissed about the subject change ...

ZELENY: You could tell.

KEILAR: ... to the plane, though. It was palpable, for sure.

ZELENY: It's palpable.

KEILAR: Jeff, thank you so much.

ZELENY: You bet.

KEILAR: Really appreciate it.

Soon, President Trump is expected to meet with House Speaker Mike Johnson and members of the House Freedom Caucus. The President stepping in to try to push through a deal after members of the ultraconservative group said they will not support his sprawling tax and spending bill without deeper spending cuts. The new standoff appears to put the Speaker's goal of having a floor vote on the bill tonight in serious doubt. Let's go to CNN's Manu Raju the Hill

And Manu, you just spoke with Speaker Johnson.

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I did. And I asked him about the demand from some of those hardline members for this vote to be delayed. The Speaker wants to have a vote on this massive bill that not just only deals with a huge overhaul of the tax code, also deep spending cuts, huge plus up in money for defense programs, new immigration laws as well proposed in this massive measure.

He wants a vote tonight. But the - a handful of the members on the far right of this conference believe the spending cuts simply do not go far enough. They're concerned about trillions of dollars being added to the deficit under this proposal and they want more time to negotiate. And I asked the Speaker whether he would delay this vote and listen to the hard-liners' demands.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: Are you still going to put this bill on the floor tonight or are you going to give the Freedom Caucus more time like they demanded?

REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): Look, we're going to have a discussion at the White House about that. We're trying to get the bill in its best possible form and we're trying to meet our deadline for the votes. The President's called for it. He's been saying this for many months that he would do it before Memorial Day.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: He made clear there he wants to move ahead before Memorial Day. And then his chief deputy, Steve Scalise, the House Majority Leader, came out afterwards and said they want to have a vote still as soon as tonight.

Now, the Speaker has managed to win over some skeptics of the plan, including some who are concerned about the impact on the deficit.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: This could add to the deficit - trillions.

REP. RICH MCCORMICK (R-GA): It's going to. Absolutely. It's not as good as I want it to be. But if the Democrats control the bill, it would be even bigger and more spending. RAJU: Critics on the conservative side are saying that this is too

much, that it would - that it's going to blow up the price tag of this bill.

REP. MIKE LAWLER (R-NY): It doesn't. We worked within the framework with the Speaker and the White House and came to an agreement, again, to provide tax relief to middle-class families.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: And that last comment came from Congressman Mike Lawler, who had been negotiating a deal with the Speaker for days as part of a block of members largely from New York and the Northeast who wanted to increase the amount that taxpayers can deduct over the state and local taxes that they paid. That caused a lot of pushback from the right flank of the party, worried that that would blow up the price tag of this bill. They called it a subsidy for those blue state lawmakers. But because of the deal that Johnson cut with the members on the more moderate side, they - those moderates are now on board behind this plan. The question now is, can you get the right flank concerned about the price tag? That's what this meeting at the White House is about this afternoon. Guys.

SANCHEZ: And we will be watching it closely. Manu Raju live on Capitol Hill. Thanks so much.

Five down, five to go. Louisiana's governor is declaring that law enforcement is, quote, "halfway there" after a fifth inmate who escaped from the New Orleans County jail was captured last night. Corey Boyd is one of the 10 inmates who broke out last Friday in one of the biggest jail breaks in the state's history.

KEILAR: And like the previous apprehensions officers, now Boyd within city limits. Here's what the state attorney general said about the remaining escapees earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LIZ MURRILL, LOUISIANA ATTORNEY GENERAL: My gut tells me that most of them are probably staying close to home unless they have significant resources somewhere else. I mean, you're just unlikely to go somewhere where you have zero support or help. And most of these if not all of these individuals grew up in New Orleans. You know, they were they were young children, really, around the time of Hurricane Katrina. Their resources are here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: CNN Senior National Correspondent Ryan Young has the latest here.

And I know, Ryan, you just spoke to people who are involved in the manhunt.

RYAN YOUNG, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: This is the last time I was live with you guys. I talked to Crimestoppers. They are stressing at this point that the tips have been coming in pretty steadily over the last few hours. In fact, you have two different sort of rewards out there, which is almost $20,000 per inmate. So, people have been calling in. They've been giving great tips so far.

[15:10:08]

One of the things that they asked for, one of the things that they wanted us to tell our viewers is to make sure that they're also giving great descriptions about what they think the people are wearing when they do see them. And so far, we talked about that nexus around New Orleans. That has been very helpful for law enforcement as they're doing this coordination.

Now, one thing that people talk about all the time, especially in law enforcement community, a lot of times between agencies in the New Orleans area, there's not sort of the cooperative nature that they need. But in this case, with hundreds of agents on the ground, that has really been put and pushed together in terms of people not only calling in but communicating to different branches of law enforcement.

The other thing that we should point out here is Massey, one of the guys you see up there on your screen on the top corner there, he's escaped from another facility before back in 2019. So, here's someone who may have had the planning involved and was able to get out of a place before. Now he's escaped again.

Of course, this plays out like a movie where they were able to get someone who worked in that facility to turn off the water so that they could push through that area because otherwise that cell would have filled with water. Right now, like you said, five have been captured. But this manhunt continues. And even right now, the tips have been flowing in, especially after one of these hits and people see pictures like this in the New Orleans area. They've been calling in.

And there's that facial recognition technology that's in that New Orleans area that has also been helping authorities sort of get hits for the positioning for where these people may be. So, this is ongoing. We continue to follow it. Guys.

KEILAR: All right. Ryan, thank you so much for that. With us now is CNN Senior Law Enforcement Analyst, Andrew McCabe. He's a former deputy director of the FBI.

And Andy, as we note, half of these escaped inmates that have been captured have all been captured inside of the city of New Orleans. What do you think about that? And do you expect that the five others are also in New Orleans or might they have fled somewhere else?

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, it's - first of all, it's very predictable for all of the reasons that the state attorney general who you had on just a few seconds ago indicated. So, it is incredibly hard to stay out on the run evading law enforcement.

And to do that, it requires significant resources and a network of people who will help you. You need first and foremost shelter. You need food. You need people who will provide that for you. If you're going to then move and try to get out of the jurisdiction, you need money and transportation.

So, it's totally predictable that these men would rely on the networks that they have. That's friends, associates, family members, girlfriends, whatever that might be in the local area. So, the task force that's trying to apprehend them is doing absolutely the right thing.

We know that fugitives who have been successful in staying out on the run, someone like a Whitey Bulger, who was a notorious organized crime member in Boston, Whitey was able to stay away for years because he had spent decades planting money, weapons, and resources in different places around the country that he knew he would need the day he went on the run. It doesn't seem like we have that same sort of forethought here.

KEILAR: Yes. A large Antoine Massey previously broke out of a detention center - a different one - in 2019 was recaptured in Lancaster, Texas. What does that tell you about how dangerous he is or where he might be?

MCCABE: You know, a lot of the ability to escape is simply depending on nerve and confidence. And so, an inmate like Massey, who's demonstrated that level of - kind of cold-blooded, steely-eyed determination to get out of the facility, that's about your most dangerous escapee right there. He's done it before. He obviously tried to do it again.

In his prior successful escape, we know that he had some associates or confederates who were nearby. He and another person went under a fence in broad daylight and simply ran away from a detention facility, hopped in a vehicle that then took them to Texas. That's where they were apprehended. So, again, he was relying on the assistance of a confederate close to the facility. Now, the question is how much assistance or support has he had this time? And has that support enabled him to get further away from New Orleans? The longer this goes and the further away they can get, the better chance they have of staying out there for a while.

KEILAR: Sheriff Hutson actually went in front of the New Orleans City Council yesterday and was pressed on disorganized and fragmented communication in the hours after the escape. How do you see it?

MCCABE: Brianna, there are so many problems, so many questions with this scenario right from the very beginning, listening to the initial reports, I mean, there are just so many things that jump out at you that clearly should not have happened. Dangerous inmates detained in a first-floor space with a door that apparently was malfunctioning and not locking properly.

[15:15:04]]

I mean, it is a jail. You've got to make sure the doors lock, please.

And then the whole escape into the handicapped-equipped cell in which they had already spent some time with tools, removing that sink and toilet piece of - you know, that was stuck to the wall there. And then, of course, securing the help of the maintenance man who turned off the water to that cell so that they wouldn't flood it and attract attention to themselves.

I mean, there's just one after another circumstances here that indicates they had significant assistance from people working in the facility. And they probably also benefited from just very lax security policies, likely caused by underfunding and understaffing. But nevertheless, this is where that leads to. When a facility is not secure, bad guys get away.

KEILAR: Yes, we saw that. Andrew McCabe, thank you so much.

MCCABE: Thanks.

KEILAR: Still to come, new suspicions that the Justice Department is being used to target the president's political enemies, as Andrew Cuomo is now under investigation right in the middle of his mayoral campaign.

And Pope Leo XIV calls on Israel to allow aid into Gaza, as new video shows desperate Palestinians scrambling to get food.

And then later, more testimony in the sex trafficking and racketeering trial of music mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs. We'll have that and much more coming up on CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

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[15:20:56]

SANCHEZ: Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is now facing a criminal investigation by the Justice Department as he's running for mayor of New York City. He's been accused by Republicans of lying to Congress about his handling of the COVID pandemic back when he was governor.

In February, the DOJ forced the dismissal of a corruption indictment against the city's current mayor, Eric Adams, who's running against Cuomo. A spokesman for Cuomo pushing back, saying, quote, "We've never been informed of any such matter, so why would someone leak it now? The answer is obvious: This is lawfare and election interference, plain and simple."

Former U.S. attorney Harry Litman joins us now live to get some perspective.

The timing of all of this is notable, given New York's Democratic mayoral primary just five weeks away, Harry.

HARRY LITMAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, not just notable, but normally a violation of DOJ principles and practice. You don't try to interfere in an election, so very much on the eve of it.

SANCHEZ: What would the charge necessarily be? Would it be lying under oath if he omitted certain details to Congress or mischaracterize the COVID response? What do you think? LITMAN: Yes, the charge would be perjury, Boris, based on a report

from New York in 2020. He testified in 2020 that did undercount the COVID deaths that happened in nursing homes. We don't have it, it was a closed-door meeting. We don't have the exact language, but it seems to be as reported something like I don't recall reviewing the report when, in fact, subsequent email showed that maybe he did.

Now, this was referred in October of 2024 by James Comer, who was upset at the testimony and the DOJ didn't do anything with it then. And people across the board, Republicans, Democrats said there's really no solid perjury case here. Then it was revived and it's now been given to Jeanine Pirro, who really shouldn't be within 10 miles of the case. She lost to Cuomo for attorney general and she called him a murderer or said he should be investigated for murder based on this conduct on Fox News. Nevertheless, she now has the reins

One more important point, if I could. The whole reason - there's a public integrity section in DOJ. They're the ones who make the calls about whether you go against public officials. There's a very good reason for that. These kinds of prosecutions are necessarily royal polarized. So, they make sure - maybe there is a solid case here. They're the ones who make the call. They are precisely the section that this new administration has demolished in the Adams case itself, when five of them resigned and everyone else has been left and they have bypassed them. So, we don't have that normal assurance of regularity that the public integrity section would provide.

SANCHEZ: Understood. What would DOJ need to prove to bring charges?

LITMAN: Well, they - you know, to bring them - you can always bring them. But to prove them in court, something like - and of course, that would be after the election. And who knows what kind of political damage he'll have suffered by then. It's five weeks away, as you say. But basically, that he intended to lie. It really matters what the exact statement is. But let's say it was as reported. I don't recall reviewing the report, that he knew he had and he intentionally lied about it. That's what they would have to prove.

It is the kind of case - do not recall cases are very hard and perjury - but it is the kind of case that at the time people across the board, including the Republican chief counsel of the committee, said, man, there's no - there's - they can't - the DOJ is not going to do this. It's not a tenable perjury case.

SANCHEZ: So, do you think he will be charged? And if so, I mean, couldn't his defense be that this is political?

[15:25:02]

LITMAN: Well, that'll be his defense in the public arena, Boris. But there's really - it's very hard to make that defense in a court of law. Normally, the answer is go through the charges and then we'll see later if you can clean it up. Do I think he'll be charged?

Look, all the pieces are in place to charge him the way the administration has been acting. And all of the pieces to actually make professional judgments are out of place, have been taken away. However, if the investigation itself, if this is really a political action, will do its damage before the primary on the 24th of June. If that's really what they're aiming for, who knows what they do after. But it is a case that I can say with confidence would not have been brought by previous DOJs.

But based on what they've done, for instance, with Judge Dugan, just as they with Congresswoman McIver yesterday, I think they could well do it. Yes.

SANCHEZ: Harry Litman, appreciate you sharing your expertise.

LITMAN: Thanks, Boris. Always a pleasure.

SANCHEZ: Up next, a YouTube star, Ms. Rachel, talks to CNN about her views on the children facing a humanitarian crisis in Gaza and about the support and bullying that she's received for speaking out. Stay with us.

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