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Bio-Smuggling Bust; Forensic Video Expert Testifies in Sean 'Diddy' Combs Trial; Budget Fight. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired June 04, 2025 - 13:00   ET

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

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ERICA HILL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The fight over President Trump's big, beautiful bill intensifying, senators heading to the White House to hammer out details amid new headwinds from Elon Musk's vocal opposition and a new report showing the bill will add over $2 trillion to the national debt.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Plus, two Chinese researchers facing charges, accused of smuggling a biological pathogen into the United States that could kill crops and harm Americans.

We're going to break down what this fungus is and exactly what they're being accused of.

And protests over a Massachusetts team detained by ICE. His detainment is set to expire this hour. We're going to give you an update, the latest on his case, and speak to his attorney, who's demanding his immediate release, as we follow these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

HILL: Republican senators downplaying Elon Musk's scathing criticism of President Trump's domestic policy agenda.

In a string of fiery tweets, Musk called the bill a disgusting abomination, adding -- quote -- "In November next year, we fire all politicians who betrayed the American people."

Senate Republicans, meantime, heading to the White House today. They're looking to hash out, of course, the concerns in an effort to drum up more votes. Even Republican Congresswoman, though, Marjorie Taylor Greene is now criticizing the bill, which it's important to note she already voted for.

Now she says, though, she's upset after discovering the bill itself actually takes away states' rights to regulate A.I. One of the central questions here too is just how much this bill would cost. The latest analysis from the Congressional Budget Office projects it will cost $2.4 trillion over the next decade. That is something the White House has repeatedly denied.

CNN's Lauren Fox is joining us now from Capitol Hill.

So, Lauren, let's start, first of all, with Elon Musk. So, very clear where Elon Musk stands in terms of this bill. Is any of that having an impact on lawmakers?

LAUREN FOX, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I mean, that's the key question here.

Elon Musk has been to Capitol Hill several times. He calls and has conversations with senators on a regular basis. And yet the question is whether or not this is going to have an impact on the way that lawmakers are thinking about supporting this bill.

At the end of the day, Trump's influence, his belief, his support for this legislation is going to carry more weight for senators than Elon Musk's view.

But the outside view of this legislation and the fact that so many lawmakers do have their own concerns about spending cuts could potentially weigh on the effort in the United States Senate, specifically the voices of people like Ron Johnson and Rand Paul, who have already been arguing that the Senate should go further than the House did in trying to implement spending cuts.

Meanwhile, a number of senators are trying to be respectful, but also sort of dismissing Musk. Here's Senator Thom Tillis.

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SEN. THOM TILLIS (R-NC): I don't want to be critical, but -- of the bill. I want to take something's a fundamentally sound project, make it better to get the 51 votes we need in the Senate.

And Mr. Musk, Mr. Musk is a brilliant guy, very, very successful. And he's also got resources. You want to drill down and talk about specific things that we need to change, that's great. But, like I said, I can't respond to platitudes.

That's all I saw on a tweet that I had summarized to me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FOX: And Tillis is one of the lawmakers expected to head to the White House today. Members of the Senate Finance -- are going to be joining Donald Trump there in an effort to try to hash out some of the sticky disagreements over some tax policy that's in that bill. So that's going to be something to really look toward.

But there is really just a fundamental difference right now between the Senate and the House in how they are viewing this piece of legislation, what needs to happen and change.

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HILL: Yes, absolutely. And the clock, as we know is ticking.

Lauren, appreciate it. Thank you -- Boris.

SANCHEZ: Let's dig deeper on this with CNN political analyst and investigative reporter for "The New York Times" David Fahrenthold.

David, thanks so much for being with us.

How concerned do you think Republicans are about Musk's comments, whether they make this bill harder to pass and even his threat of firing some of them?

DAVID FAHRENTHOLD, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I don't think they're that concerned, honestly.

Musk had a lot of power a few weeks ago, not because he was Elon Musk, but because people saw him as sort of an avatar and a spokesman for the Trump movement, for Donald Trump. That's where the real power resides here. Now that Musk is on his own, he certainly has a lot of money and he's making threats to follow through on firing these folks campaigning against them next year.

But that hasn't happened yet. That's a long way away. And where is Musk going to go? The power base here is Trump. If he's going to break away from Trump and try to build some sort of power base in conservative politics separate from Trump, a lot of people have tried that. Good luck.

SANCHEZ: On the Senate side, we have seen a number of Republicans, including Rand Paul, rail against a number of provisions in this bill, including raising the debt ceiling.

What is your sense of the discontent among the Republican ranks? Does it potentially derail this self-imposed July 4 deadline that Senator Thune has set?

FAHRENTHOLD: I think it could derail that deadline, but I don't think it will derail this bill.

The Republican senators want to pass something. They want to pass something that's Donald Trump's agenda. And I think they will find a way to get to yes on this. What we have seen in the past is that these deficit hawks in the last few budget fights have said, oh, no, we're never going to root for this, I never possibly would I ever vote for something like this, but then when Trump leans on them hard enough, they find some way to declare victory and get out of the way.

And think of all people who were going to block Trump's nominees, who were going to block some earlier spending bills. These people eventually cave because Trump has more political power.

SANCHEZ: Perhaps more than in the recent past, the national deficit and the debt are huge concerns, especially given tariffs and the state of the economy and questions about revenue and a new tax code and the fairness of it.

I wonder what you make of these claims from Republicans in leadership, especially Speaker Mike Johnson, dismissing this estimate from the Congressional Budget Office, saying that the CBO is often wrong.

FAHRENTHOLD: This is what everybody says when the Congressional Budget Office says their bill is going to cost too much, Democrats and Republicans. It's what -- nobody ever says, oh, they're right, we're never going to do this.

That's what they always say, the CBO has gotten it wrong, we're not going to cost that much.

Listen, the innovation that Trump made in Republican politics was not caring about the deficit. Think of how many other Republicans had gone down to defeat, Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney, trying to make the country care about cutting back things like Medicare, Social Security, Pentagon spending. People didn't want that.

And Trump's innovation was to say, I don't care. I think we're continuing that here. The question is, can you go so far that the economy reacts, the bond market reacts, the dollar sinks? And I think that's the real break here, not anyone's sort of philosophical beliefs about the deficit or debt.

SANCHEZ: Absolutely. And there are warnings about that from Jamie Dimon and others about the bond market specifically.

I wonder what you think about this $9.4 billion rescissions package that the White House just sent to Congress. It would claw back funding that's previously been appropriated, but it largely follows the sort of blueprint that DOGE laid out for certain cuts. What do you know about where these clawbacks are going to come from?

FAHRENTHOLD: Well, it does target things like the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the USAID, things that are sort of longtime targets of conservatives.

It's important to note, though, how much smaller this is than Elon Musk said his budget cuts were going to be. He was talking about a trillion dollars, originally $2 trillion cut out of the federal budget before the start of next year. Now we're talking about a few million.

And even that, I don't really see it having a great path to passage in the Senate. I just think this is being put out there to placate some of the folks who supported DOGE, placate Musk allegedly, and to -- but I don't think it's going to go anywhere. I don't think we're actually going to see this money rescinded.

SANCHEZ: David Fahrenthold, thanks for joining us.

FAHRENTHOLD: Thank you.

SANCHEZ: Erica.

HILL: Turning to the Sean "Diddy" Combs sex trafficking and racketeering trial, we are about to hear more testimony from a woman named Bryana Bongolan.

Now, she's seen here arriving to court this morning. She is a friend of Cassie Ventura, Combs' ex-girlfriend, and she's testifying under an immunity order. She's accused the rat mogul of sexual battery and also alleges he dangled her over a 17-story balcony. Earlier today, she described once seeing Combs throw a knife at Ventura, who she says threw it back.

Bongolan also recalled seeing her friend with a black eye and with bruises. We also heard testimony today from a forensic video expert who says he reviewed cell phone video, that infamous hotel assault video as well, and what he described as various sex videos.

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Joining me now, legal analyst and trial attorney Mercedes Colwin.

So, Mercedes, when we look at all of this, let's start first with this friend of Cassie Ventura's, the fact that she's testifying under immunity. She's now the third witness to do so. Why do you think she would need immunity here?

MERCEDES COLWIN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, certainly -- that's a great question. That's key, because, obviously, it can show that there's some bias in her testimony because she has a prearranged arrangement with the prosecutors to give helpful testimony.

So that's always tricky for the prosecution. But it might very well be the fact that she knew of some of these issues, of course, that Cassie Ventura testified to, the extreme violence that she was subjected to, according to her testimony, the fact that she didn't help -- that she didn't do anything to assist her in one in one way or the other, or maybe was somehow complicit.

But it really is the pressure that was the prosecutors may have done to her during just asking her about her relationship with Cassie Ventura. It may have come up that during the time that she had these discussions with the federal investigators, that she may have had some inconsistencies.

And we know that there are stand-alone crimes that attach to those types of discussions with federal investigators. If you have a conversation with a federal investigator, it is on the record. And if you make any missteps, if you state anything that's inconsistent, that's a separate and -- a separate crime.

And so it may have happened that during her conversations with federal and prosecutors talking about the -- what happened to Cassie Ventura and with Combs that there may have been those missteps. And that would have brought up the need for an agreement.

And it just might be, Erica, if she consulted with a lawyer -- certainly, when clients come to me as a defense attorney, I make those arrangements preemptively with prosecutors ahead of time, not thinking that there's going to be any sort of crime.

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HILL: Just in case? COLWIN: Exactly.

HILL: OK.

COLWIN: It's a belts and suspenders -- that's belts and suspenders type of approach.

HILL: But question for you. You said this can be tricky for the prosecution. Does testifying under immunity in any way impact a witness' standing with the jury?

COLWIN: Oh, undoubtedly. If you sit there as a juror and you hear that there is this arrangement with the prosecution, they will come to the conclusion that they are going to -- that witness is going to give favorable testimony in order to ensure that that agreement stays in place and they're not subsequently prosecuted.

So it's up to the prosecution to ensure some rehabilitation after the cross-examination. And we have to see -- I know she's back on the stand this afternoon -- what the defense will do to dismantle, certainly to dismantle this type -- their testimony during her direct examination.

The prosecution will have to come forward and talk about, you know that you're under oath, you know you're testifying truthfully, there's no reason for you to lie, is there? I mean, they will have to give some rehabilitation to Bongolan.

Otherwise, the jury is really going to suspect, and the defense is going to hammer it home, whether it's during cross-examination or certainly at the close, how this is a compromised witness and everything she testified so far about the violence that Combs allegedly did to Cassie Ventura, including throwing a knife, and including what she testified, and that she was dangled over a balcony at the hands of Combs, all very complicated issues and certainly issues that can very much implicate Combs significantly.

HILL: Mercedes, appreciate it, as always. Thank you.

COLWIN: My pleasure.

HILL: Still to come here: the Department of Justice charging two Chinese researchers with smuggling a biological pathogen into the United States. Their alleged motive is ahead.

Plus, we are waiting to see whether a beloved Massachusetts high schooler will be released from ICE custody after being detained on his way to volleyball practice, that bond hearing just moments away.

And a bit later, the Trump administration, we're learning, will no longer require hospitals to provide emergency abortions to women whose health and potentially their lives may be in danger. A leading group of doctors says it will in fact put people's lives in danger.

We have those stories and much more all coming up this hour on CNN NEWS CENTRAL. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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HILL: We're learning more details about the Chinese nationals accused of smuggling a bio-pathogen into the U.S.

The Department of Justice is accusing the couple of bringing over a toxic fungus, which the FBI calls a potential agroterrorism weapon. The pathogen is known to cause billions of dollars in damage to crops. And if it is ingested, it can lead to liver damage and even birth defects in both livestock and people.

CNN security correspondent Josh Campbell joining me now.

So what more do we know, Josh, about this, about this pathogen and the circumstances surrounding how it got here?

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Erica, when we talk about agroterrorism, what that refers to is someone who is intentionally putting some type of pathogen or biological agent into crops, into the U.S. food supply.

It's important to note that is not what the Justice Department is charging here. They don't say that this couple was intending to use this material for some type of nefarious purpose, but they're taking it very seriously.

And what we know about this pathogen, it's called fusarium graminearum. We know from the Justice Department that it has resulted in billions of dollars in economic losses to crops. It can cause serious illness, vomiting, liver damage, reproductive defects in livestock, as well as in human beings. And what the Justice Department alleges is that this couple smuggled some of that material in.

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It was about a year ago that the boyfriend here was stopped at an airport in Michigan. His items were searched by customs officials, who found inside of a crumpled-up tissue some of this material. He was asked about it. He said, I don't know how it got there. Maybe someone else put it there.

Fast-forward now, a year later, both of them have been criminally charged with smuggling, as well as with visa violations, as well as lying to federal investigators.

Now, Attorney General Pam Bondi came out with a statement. I will read you part of that. She said that: "The Department of Justice has no higher mission than keeping the American people safe and protecting our nation from hostile foreign actors. This defendant who clandestinely attempted to bring a destructive substance into the United States will face years behind bars."

Of course, that's too soon to see whether this is going to go to trial, whether they would be convicted, whether there's some type of plea, but, again, something that the officials are taking very seriously.

It's also worth pointing out just from an intelligence and law enforcement standpoint, this doesn't really fit the mold of what we have seen in the past with the Chinese. The FBI has accused the Chinese government of trying to exfiltrate certain material from U.S. research labs and the like, essentially steal it for their own purposes.

We don't really see the case of them bringing it into the U.S., and, again, as I mentioned at the top, no indication right now from DOJ that this was terrorism. Nevertheless, we see these federal charges.

HILL: Yes, wow. It is really something.

Josh, appreciate it. Thank you -- Boris.

SANCHEZ: With us now to discuss is former D.C. Chief of Homeland Security and Intelligence Donell Harvin. He's a bioterrorism expert for Interpol and Harvard School of Public Health.

Donell, thanks for being with us.

How dangerous is this fungus? Does it rise to the level of a national security threat potentially?

DONELL HARVIN, FORMER D.C. CHIEF OF HOMELAND SECURITY AND INTELLIGENCE: Certainly, it does.

And many individuals in the scientific community have said this could have catastrophic, near-catastrophic effects on our agriculture -- understand that our agriculture is a large part of our GDP -- if it was released.

SANCHEZ: And how common is this kind of smuggling? How hard is it to detect?

HARVIN: Well, those are two different questions.

This type of smuggling is actually rare, as Josh said in the lead-in. Most of the time we see these cases, it's researchers exfiltrating or trying to remove information or materials outside of the U.S. from their research.

So, in 2019, we had a Harvard researcher that was a Chinese national that smuggled 21 samples of a biological agent in a sock and tried to get out of Logan Airport. We have seen other incidents where China has actually been involved in either doing cyberattacks to try to get this information or having operatives that are sent here as students try to get this information outside of the country.

So it's particularly rare in my research to show that individuals are actually bringing that here. But, once again, if that gets out, that can have catastrophic effects. And you can see how they wouldn't want to do that type of research in their home country.

SANCHEZ: Now, Liu admitted that he wanted to clone these samples. And I wonder, from an investigative perspective, how do you discern intent here, whether the goal might have been agroterrorism or just research and potentially carelessness in smuggling it in?

HARVIN: And this is the hard part.

Boris, I'm an epidemiologist. I travel the country as well as the world training customs and border and law enforcement officials in trying to determine what we call dual-use technology. And dual-use technology basically means that it could be used for good or evil.

And so investigators and prosecutors have probably spent the last year trying to get to the heart of this individual's motives. It doesn't matter whether the person had good intentions. If there's some type of mistake or mishap or release, that can have catastrophic consequences.

SANCHEZ: Yes.

And given what you just described, the touring, so to speak, that you have done around the country sort of imparting this knowledge on folks, are you confident in the system that's currently in place in the United States to find and thwart these potential biological pathogens?

HARVIN: Well, let's say this is a win for our homeland security professionals.

Once again, this type of material should not be smuggled in into any country. One of the things that we find it's quite difficult -- and what I do and the work I do is working with customs and border officials to try to interdict this stuff at the border, not just these materials, but the technology that's used and laboratory equipment, the expertise that's used to study this stuff.

The problem is that many of the research centers and a lot of our homeland security enterprise is geared towards detecting what we call the insider threat. These are individuals that are actually working in these research labs trying to exfiltrate on the behalf of the Chinese government information and technology.

And so you really have to look both ways. You have to look at the individuals that are coming here to do research, as well as those who are trying to take research away from us and stealing intellectual property.

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SANCHEZ: Donell Harvin, appreciate the expertise. Thanks for joining us.

Disaster after disaster. CNN is finding evidence that President Trump approved FEMA aid without alerting a key partner, FEMA itself. We have new details of alarming delays in right after this.

And breaking news into CNN, President Donald Trump speaking to Russian leader Vladimir Putin -- the latest on what they discussed, what it means potentially for Ukraine and for Iran. We will be right back.

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